Psyc 414 Exam 3

Nondeclarative memory type

skill/motor/procedural

skill

ability that can improve over time thru practice

• depends on complexity, encoding level, frequency, conditions of recall

expert

person who performs a skill better than most 

perceptual-motor skill

learned mvmt patterns guided by sensory inputs 

cognitive skill

requires problem solving/application of strategies

features of skill memories

• Difficult to convey except by demonstration 

• May be acquired w/o awareness 

• Require many repetitions

(vs declarative mem that can be conveyed flexibly, consciously accessible, single exposure) 

 Cognitive vs Perceptual-motor Skills 

• Cognitive depends on intellectual process 

• Perceptual-motor depends on physical dexterity/speed/strength

• Perceptual-motor learned first THEN cognitive skills in bbs

• nonhumans show cog skills via tool use (not all species can)

closed skill

predefined mvmts that never vary

open skills

mvmts based on predictions about changing demands of enviro 

knowledge of results

feedback about performance—prediction error/learning signal

• critical to effective practice

power law of practice

improved performance from practice decreases after a certain point, as practice inc

-learning occurs quickly at first then slows down

• BUT, new sources of feedback can lead to a new burst of rapid mvmt

massed practice

concentrated, continuous

spaced practice

spread out over several sessions

• improves perf better than massed

• even if fewer total hrs than massed, it takes longer

constant practice

constrained set of skills

variable practice

wide variety of contexts (i.e. gradually inc difficulty/changing task condition)

implicit learning

happens w/o awareness of whats been learned

• antero amnesia implicit skill learning

serial reaction time task

press a certain key when visual cue comes—perceptual motor skills

• RT faster for fixed seq vs random

  • implicitly learned to anticipate the keys w/o awareness of a fixed seq

motor programs / habits

perceptual-motor skills with minimal attention

3 stages of skill learning

• Cognitive stage: actively think to encode/perform a skill 

  • Using written instructions or verbalized rules

• Associative stage: stereotyped actions & rely less on actively recalled memories of rules

  • Setting up tent in a fixed seq w/o instructions 

• Autonomous stage: skill become motor programs 

  • Mvmts seem automatic—setting up tent while talking ab art 

talent

master a skill with little effort, “gift” for that skill

rotary pursuit task for percep-motor skill learning

Twin study showed that w/ prac, genetic predispositions for a skill can take over

• identical twins = correls btwn them inc with training

• fraternal = correls dec with training (less similar w/ prac)

• shows that practice decreases effects of previous experience (nurture) & inc effects of genetic influences (nature)

transfer specificity

restricted applicability of learned skills to specific situations

Identical elements theory

transfer of learned abilities to novel situations depends on # of identical elements in new situation (playing on hard vs clay; playing tennis vs badminton) 

Learning set formation

acquiring ability to learn novel tasks rapidly based on frequent experiences with similar tasks (opening doors)

skill decay

loss of a skill thru non-use (related to passive forgetting)

skill-memory systems

basal ganglia, cerebral cortex, cerebellum

• modulates control of mvmt

• assocs btwn sensory perceptions & motor mvmts formed thru repetition

• info from all sensory modals & motor reaches striatum (BG)

BG & skill learning

• gets lots of cortical input (first thru striatum), damage disrupts skill learning

• imp for cog and percep-motor learning

  • control velocity, direction, amp of mvmt, prep to move

learning deficits after BG/hipp lesions

-learn to avoid revisiting arms: Hipp damage impairs this

-learn to enter arms w light (learned percep-motor assoc): BG damage impairs this

Deliberative decision-making system 

• Evaluations made "online" taking goal & motivation into account

• Flexible, but computationally expensive & slow 

deliberation

1. Determine potential possibilities (form cog map)

2. evaluate likely outcomes

3. select action 

• T maze deliberating: can self-correct at early pts but start over (punish) if wrong choice at last 

• Early trials = deliberation, later trials = habitual 

Vicarious trial & err - VTE

pause at decision points & look back n forth at options (looks like deliberation) 

• when behaviorally looking back n forth, hipp place cells imagine going L/R

• occurs at final choice pt

• dec as beh becomes habit 

mental time travel

• imagines another time/place from one's past (episodic mem) or in future (episodic future thinking) 

• Stage 2 of deliberation (requires knowledge of past) 

episodic future thinking

• Imagining possible future events activates similar representational systems to remembering past events 

• Hipp damage impairs both episodic mem&future thinking

Neural activity during perceptual-motor skill task 

Task: high or low freq. tone to indicate reward on L/R arm 

• in early training, neurons fire strongly when chose which way to turn 

• In late training, neurons shift to coding the beg and end of ea trial (autonomous stage)

• This shows: BG neurons changes with learning percep-motor skill 

cortical rep of skills

• Practicing a percep-motor task can cause reps within motor cortex to expand—Plasticity/reorg 

• experience affects circuits!

cerebellum & skills

• involved in encoding, retrieving, & forming skill mems

• lesions disrupt mirror tracing BUT rates of learning same

WM

active & temp rep of info that is maintained for the short-term, available for manipulation 

• Rehearsal is imp to keep info active/accessible 

cog/exec control

manipulation & application of WM for planning, task-switch, attention, stimulus selection, inhibit reflexive responses

LTM

permanent storage of memory that lasts beyond conscious attention

-accessed slowly, unlimited capacity, forgotten slower

STM

temporary memory maintained thru active rehearsal 

• active contents of consciousness, rapidly accessed, limited in capacity, forgotten quick 

• Broad class of transient mems 

• Atkinson-Shiffrin model = sensory & STM

transient memory

nonpermanent memory that lasts secs to mins; short-lasting

• Sensory mems are brief transient sensations of what you perceived when you seen/heard/etc 

Baddeley’s WM model

visuospatial sketchpad (object/location info) & phonological loop (aud/verbal info) controlled by central exec (add items from LTM, transfer info)

• Assess CE by asking ppl to keep track of previous responses 

Phonological loop 

• w/o rehearsal, ppl retain 2 sec worth of info in loop 

• Internal unspoken speech during rehearsal is vital

• Word-length effect: tendency for a person to remember fewer words from a list as the length of words increases 

Visuospatial sketchpad 

• Similar to loop, limited capacity but capacities are separate 

  • Dual-task experiments provide evidence for the independence of the two buffers 

• Delayed nonmatch-to-sample is a test of visual memory  

cog control tasks

• Update STM: N-back task, self-ordered search 

• Goal setting/planning: Tower of Hanoi (keep track of subgoals) 

• Task switching: WCST 

• Stimulus attention/response inhibition: Stroop task 

Behavior changes after frontal damage 

loss of ability to plan & organize (Dysexecutive syndrome)

• Deficits in ALL WM/cog control tasks 

  • can learn initial rule but later, they show perseveration—fail to learn a new rule & persist on old rule

• Tumors, surgery, strokes, blunt-force trauma 

3 divisions of PFC

orbital

medial

lateral - DLPFC (top left & right sides) and VLPFC (lower left & right sides) 

• DLPFC for higher-order exec control (monitor/manipulate stored info)—central exec 

• VLPFC supports encoding/retrieval of info (rehearsal/maintenance)--visuospatial sketchpad/phonological rehearsal loop 

Orbitofrontal cortex & predicting outcomes 

• Ventral surface of PFC, high-level association cortex 

• Involved in learning to predict outcomes of beh (R-->O) 

• input = sensory & output = goes to striatum

Eye-gaze task: frontal activity during WM task 

inc firing during delay, showing holding info of cue location in WM until info is needed (persistent activity in DLPFC)

Sequential activity in delayed alteration task

activity passed from one neuron to another—chain of neurons trying to maintain same info one at a time 

• Specificity in the timing and L/R info, both on correct & err trials

anatomical mapping of cog control & WM

• VLPFC supports encoding/retrieval

• DLPFC supports higher order functions 

  • Visuospatial (abstract items in self-order task) in right DLPFC activity 

  • Phonological (verbal items in task) mostly in left DLPFC activity but strong in L&R 

place models of memory

"multi-store" — 2+ places for memories to be stored 

• Cowan model where LTM info can be activated as STM focus of attention

state-based models

• 1 place for memory that can be in various states 

• WM emerges from a network of regions, all of which send/receive info to/from PFC 

frontal-posterior circuits

Frontal activity projects back to posterior, which projects forward to frontal  

• Exec process in frontal & representations of items in posterior areas where they are stored

• Frontal activity induces sustained activation of posterior regions 

  • flow of control within frontal goes from anterior regions (for high levels of abstract goals) toward back of frontal (specific subgoals)  

emotion

program of actions triggered by stimuli 

• Distinct emotions hardwired in humans (happy, sad, anger, fear, disgust, surprise) 

• Not all humans interpret emotions the same BUT physiological responses/conscious feelings associated w/ emotions are innate/universal 

3 phenomena in emotion

-Physiological/autonomic responses

-Overt Beh (muscle mvmt)

-Conscious feel

Physiological/autonomic responses 

• Facilitate beh & mobilization of energy 

• ANS signals adrenal glands to release stress hormones (epinephrine & GCs/stress hormones like cortisol) 

  • GCs bind to receptors all over body/brain

HPA Axis steps

• Step 1: you feel stress & hypothalamus release CRH (from PVN) 

• Step 2: CRH causes pituitary to release ACTH

• Step 3: ACTH causes adrenal glands to release GCs

• Step 4: hypothalamus responds to GCs to reduce CRH if GCs are high (negative feedback system) 

HPA axis influence on body

• impacts memory 

• GCs can have long-lasting effects on regulating regions

  • More GCs can dec LTP & inc errors in task 

  • Stress-induced hippocampal damage 

conscious feeling

-Subjective experience / perceptions

-Occurs when the mind senses the physiological responses associated with fear/arousal 

Two-factor theory of attention

• combo of cog appraisal AND perception of biological changes determine conscious feelings of emotion 

  • Cog awareness helps interpret bodily responses consistent with the current context 

Somatic theories of emotion

• bodily responses to stimuli first, then conscious feeling (Lange theory) 

• ^not true....they occur simultaneously & independently 

  • Bodily responses = hypothalamic structures, & emotion feelings = thalamus 

fear response

physiological change, overt beh, & conscious reactions from fear 

piloerection

fear response where body hair stands on end, making animal look bigger & more threatening 

conditioned emotional response

a CR produced in response to a CS, that is paired with an emotional US 

• Overt behavior (freezing—innate) or high BP (autonomic response) 

Conditioned escape

learn to make response in order to escape aversive stimuli

• Escape learning = operant conditioning 

• S^D (shock) --> R (lever press) --> O (escape) 

  • Negative reinforcement 

learned helplessness

uncontrollable punisher teaches responses are ineffectual —> motivation to escape reduced

mood congruency of memory

easiest to retrieve mems that match emotional state

brain areas imp for emotion

Hippocampus (episodic mem formation)

Thalamus (sensory info relay) 

Hypothalamus (regulate body response) 

amygdala

-at anterior tip of hippocampi

-critical for learning/expressing emotions and mediate emotional modulation of memory formation

-activity triggers physiological arousal AND behavioral responses

• Lateral nucleus > Basolateral nucleus > Central nucleus

• Lesions to central nucleus disrupt learning/showing new emotional responses

amygdala + fear

Important for fear 

• Visual info reaches amygdala 

• Unilateral amygdala lesion (left)-->interhemispheric connections severed-->visual info to left eye >no fear response

  • But if using right eye, normal fear response  

amygdala bilateral damage

deficits in learning emotional responses

fail to learn CCed emotional responses

Patient SM—recognized all expressions EXCEPT fear

2 pathways into amygdala

fast-and-rough VS slow-but-accurate 

• Direct pathway from thalamus to amygdala is faster BUT less detail 

• Indirect pathway from thalamus>cortex>amygdala is slower BUT more detailed

basolateral amygdala & CC/danger learning

• neutral CS paired with a fear-evoking US

  • US: shock; CS: almond odor; Neutral: anise odor 

  • Before CS-US pairing, neither odor elicited BLA response 

  • After pairing almond + shock, BLA neurons strongly responded to almond but not neutral odor 

where in brain context is learned

contextual info from hipp helps amygdala trigger emo responses 

• returning to context where an emo experience occurred is enough to evoke emo response 

conditioned contextual learning

tone-shock assoc & show freezing to tone 

• assoc btwn context (chamber) & shock, and show freezing to just being placed back in chamber 

• Hippocampus necessary to learn context-shock assoc 

amygdala & memory encoding

• More amygdala activation during encoding assoc with better memory later ONLY FOR EMOTIONAL CONTENT 

  • Activation unrelated for neutral vids 

stress hormones & memory encoding

• ANS signals adrenal glands to release stress hormones (GC's/epin)

  • blocking Norepinephrine (NT that can cross BBB, unlike epin) reduces memory for emotional material 

• Light-dark box study—shocked in dark side then given epinephrine 

  • time-dependent enhancement of emotional memory

  • shorter delay before drug given = longer hesitation before reentering dark side 

stress & hippocampus

-stress induced damage (decreased size & loss of neurons)

• preg monkey given synthetic GCs & fetus have ^

social learning

actively monitor events then choose later actions based on those observations 

• Diff from CC/OC since we cannot reliably predict what an organism will learn from observing

copying

prereqs for copying: social modeling (Bobo doll experiment) & perspective taking (imagine yourself in place of another)

2 types of copying: true imitation & emulation

true imitation

reproducing motor acts 

• Two-action test—compare imitations 

• True imitation does not always entail perspective taking 

emulation

replicating an outcome w/o replicating specific motor acts (novel actions that lead to same outcome of modeler)

Bandura’s 4 processes for copying

1. Presence of model 

2. Memories for observed situation stored in accessible format so they can guide later actions 

3. Ability to reproduce action 

4. Motivation for reproducing action 

social learning theory

the reinforcements observed in past social contexts creates a memory & determines future actions

• Bandura says we gain info about rewards/punish by observing modeler’s outcomes

emotional contagion

emotionally react to visual/acoustic stimuli that show emotional responses 

(typically by replicating the observed response—NOT b/c of imitation but b/c of unconditioned response) 

observational conditioning

learn emo response after observing similar responses in others 

• hard to distinguish from imitative learning 

• Blackbirds' UR to an owl (US) = attack 

  • Bottle becomes CS that elicits CR (attack) 

stimulus enhancement

observations of others draws attention toward specific things within an enviro 

• Powerfully affects learning—focus is drawn to a subset of features within an enviro that might provide useful info 

• Increases likelihood of exposure to that stimuli + outcome 

vocal imitation

• Best in humans & birds, other animals show little ability 

  • Animals training to produce sounds = conditioning, not vocal imitation 

• Vocal learning = adjusting sound production based on previous

song learning in birds

• Abnormal singing in isolated birds  

• Template model of song learning: song memorization, song practices, song utilization 

  • Birds learn proper social contexts to sing songs 

social transmission of info

communicate info that may affect future actions of group members 

• Seen in ALL human cultures

social conformity

adopt behavior of the group 

• Protective & rapid acquisition BUT may hinder development of novel beh 

• Guppies chose same escape route as modeler, even if other option closer 

  • stimulus enhancement

direct-matching hypothesis

mems for actions are stored in specialized cortical regions that map observed actions onto motor representations of the actions 

mirror neurons

fire the same way during observations of an action and while performing the action  

• Mechanism for true imitation

emotional mirror neurons

• Observer sees other get shocked & neurons in observer's ACC respond strongly  

• Observer rat then caused pain via laser & Same neurons in ACC respond 

• shows emotional mirror neurons responding to pain, not fear

mirror neurons in songbirds

• High vocal center (HVC) controls timing

• Robust nucleus of archistriatum (RA) controls detail

• LMAN is frontal cortex-like in mammals & Area X = basal ganglia 

sequential replay of future trajectories

• Observer watch demonstrator make correct turn 

• Observer hippocampal neurons become active sequentially along the correct trajectory

developing memory

• By 6 weeks, process/respond to sensory stimuli 

• By 25 weeks, brain & sense organs develop to start learning sounds 

  • Habituation & recognition possible before birth 

• episodic memory matures slower than semantic

conditioning & skill learning

• Explosion of learning in 1^st few yrs of life 

• Complex motor skills come gradually, as physical development helps muscle strength & perceptual-motor coordination 

• During age 1-2, language basics 

• During age 4-5, complex grammar/reading 

elicited imitation

• technique for assessing mems in preverbal infants 

  • Shown an action & tested for ability to mimic later 

• begin to imitate sounds during first few months