Cognitive Neuroscience: Attention and Memory Systems

Vocabulary flashcards covering attentional networks, multi-store and multiple memory systems, prefrontal and hippocampal anatomy, neural circuits of explicit and implicit memory, amnesias, and related neurological disorders.

Focus (Mirsky's Model)

The ability to select target information from an array for enhanced processing.

Sustain (Mirsky's Model)

The capacity to maintain focus and alertness over time.

Shift (Mirsky's Model)

The ability to change attentive focus in a flexible and adaptive manner.

Alerting Network

Attentional system that functions to maintain alertness, speed up reaction, and suppress other cerebral processing; mediated by the reticular activating system (RAS) in the midbrain, adrenergic projections from the locus coeruleus in the brainstem, and modulated by norepinephrine.

Orienting Network

Attentional system responsible for directing attention to sensory events; includes the superior parietal lobe, temporoparietal junction, frontal eye fields, and superior colliculus, and is modulated by acetylcholine.

Executive Attention Network

Attentional system that regulates attention and voluntary control of cognition and emotion; involves the anterior cingulate cortex, lateral ventral prefrontal cortex, and basal ganglia, modulated by dopamine.

Posner's Attention System

A neuroanatomical framework dividing attention into three distinct networks: alerting (locus coeruleus, right frontal, parietal cortex), orienting (superior parietal, temporoparietal junction, frontal eye fields, superior colliculus), and executive attention (anterior cingulate, lateral ventral prefrontal, basal ganglia).

Retrograde Memory

Time-based classification of memory referring to memory for events that occurred in the past.

Anterograde Memory

Time-based classification of memory referring to ongoing memory processing in the present and the acquisition of new memories.

Prospective Memory

Time-based form of memory directed toward the future, such as planning and remembering to carry out future intentions.

Iconic Store

Sensory memory store that briefly holds visual input just long enough for visual stimuli to be perceived smoothly as a single meaningful unit.

Echoic Store

Sensory memory store that retains auditory input briefly so that sounds can be processed and understood.

Short-Term Memory

Temporary storage of information being processed across cognitive tasks with limited capacity, serving as a relay station to send chunks to long-term memory, use and discard immediately, or save for future use.

Maintenance Rehearsal

A retention strategy in working memory that involves mentally repeating information without deep associative elaboration.

Elaborative Rehearsal

An associative memory strategy connecting new incoming data to existing knowledge, enabling long-term memory storage.

Chunking

The cognitive process of grouping individual pieces of data into smaller, meaningful units (such as phone number segments) to maximize short-term memory capacity.

Explicit Memory

Conscious, declarative memory system consisting of episodic memory (personal experiences and autobiographical events) and semantic memory (general facts and world knowledge).

Semantic Memory

All nonautobiographical knowledge about the world, which does not depend on the medial-temporal lobe-ventral-prefrontal-lobe memory system that subserves episodic memory.

Implicit Memory

Nonconscious, nondeclarative memory system comprising motor skills, habits, priming, and classical conditioning.

Implicit Memory Neural Circuit

Proposed subcortical and cortical loop for implicit memory involving sensory and motor inputs into neocortex, basal ganglia (modulated by dopamine from substantia nigra), ventral thalamus, and premotor cortex.

Emotional Memory

Memory system involving both conscious and nonconscious processes that governs affective associations, including attraction, avoidance, and fear.

Dorsolateral Prefrontal Cortex (DLPFC)

Frontal lobe region responsible for organizing material to be remembered during encoding, and monitoring and verifying retrieved information during retrieval.

Ventrolateral Prefrontal Cortex (VLPFC)

Frontal lobe region responsible for semantic and phonological elaborative processing during encoding, and cue specification, strategic searching, and maintenance during retrieval.

Anterior Prefrontal Cortex (APFC)

Prefrontal region responsible for higher-level mnemonic control operations during memory retrieval.

Dentate Gyrus

Hippocampal structure composed of stellate granule cells, described functionally as sensory cells and essential for encoding new memories.

Ammon's Horn

Hippocampal region composed of pyramidal cells divided into four fields ($CA_1$, $CA_2$, $CA_3$, and $CA_4$), described functionally as motor cells.

Perforant Pathway

Neural tract providing direct reciprocal connections between the hippocampus and the posterior temporal cortex neocortex.

Fimbria-Fornix

Major efferent tract that connects the hippocampus to the thalamus, prefrontal cortex, basal ganglia, and hypothalamus.

Anterograde Amnesia

Memory impairment characterized by an inability to form or acquire new memories following a brain injury or neurological event.

Global Anterograde Amnesia

Severe impairment in the ability to form new long-term memories across a wide variety of domains and modalities.

Retrograde Amnesia

Memory loss involving the inability to access memories formed prior to the onset of brain injury; often incomplete with older memories better preserved than recent ones.

System Consolidation Theory

Theory stating that the role of the hippocampus is to consolidate memories, making them permanent, hold them for a time, and then send them to be stored elsewhere in the brain.

Multiple-Trace Theory

Theory positing that autobiographic, factual semantic, and general semantic memories rely on different brain regions, and older memories resist amnesia because each recall creates new traces and changes their brain localization.

Patient H.M.

Famous patient who underwent bilateral transection of the temporal lobes for epilepsy; experienced profound anterograde amnesia with preserved above-average IQ and intact remote past memories.

Transient Global Amnesia

A temporary condition featuring both retrograde loss of old memories and anterograde inability to form new ones, often occurring as an isolated single event.

Herpes Simplex Encephalitis

Infection causing medial-temporal-lobe damage that leads to anterograde amnesia, alongside insular damage contributing to retrograde amnesia.

Alzheimer's Disease

Progressive disease beginning with cellular degeneration in the medial temporal cortex causing anterograde amnesia, later spreading to temporal association and frontal areas to produce retrograde amnesia.

Korsakoff's Syndrome

Amnestic condition caused by a thiamine ($\text{vitamin B}_1$) deficiency secondary to chronic alcohol use; characterized by anterograde/retrograde amnesia, confabulation, meager conversation, lack of insight, and apathy, with damage in the medial thalamus, mammillary bodies, and frontal lobe atrophy.

Psychogenic Amnesia

Non-organic memory loss conditions including infantile amnesia, sleep amnesia, and dissociative states, multiple personality, or simulated amnesia.

Asperger's Syndrome (Memory Context)

A form of autism in which individuals exhibit high intellectual functioning coupled with exceptional memory capabilities.

Savant

An individual who has an intellectual disability but exhibits a profound, specialized ability in domains such as mathematics, memory, or music.

Highly Superior Autobiographical Memory (HSAM)

Exceptional cognitive ability allowing individuals to accurately and exhaustively recall detailed personal life events, including dates, weather, and incidental social details.