Cortico-hippocampal network connections support the multidimensional quality of episodic memory
Abstract
Episodic memories reflect a bound representation of multimodal features that can be reinstated with varying precision. Yet little is known about how brain networks involved in memory, including the hippocampus and posterior-medial (PM) and anterior-temporal (AT) systems, interact to support the quality and content of recollection. Participants learned color, spatial, and emotion associations of objects, later reconstructing the visual features using a continuous color spectrum and 360-degree panorama scenes. Behaviorally, dependencies in memory were observed for the gist but not precision of event associations. Supporting this integration, hippocampus, AT, and PM regions showed increased connectivity and reduced modularity during retrieval compared to encoding. These inter-network connections tracked a multidimensional, objective measure of memory quality. Moreover, distinct patterns of connectivity tracked item color and spatial memory precision. These findings demonstrate how hippocampal-cortical connections reconfigure during episodic retrieval, and how such dynamic interactions might flexibly support the multidimensional quality of remembered events.
Data availability
Data and code have been made available via GitHub: https://github.com/memobc/paper-orbitfmri
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A functional neuroimaging study of item and spatial context memory precisionGitHub, memobc/paper-orbitfmri.
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Recognizing Scene Viewpoint using Panoramic Place Representationpeople.csail.mit.edu/jxiao, SUN360.
Article and author information
Author details
Funding
National Institutes of Health (R00MH103401)
- Maureen Ritchey
The funders had no role in study design, data collection and interpretation, or the decision to submit the work for publication.
Ethics
Human subjects: Informed consent was obtained from all participants prior to the experiment. Procedures were approved by the Boston College Institutional Review Board (17.026).
Reviewing Editor
- Muireann Irish, University of Sydney, Australia
Publication history
- Received: January 28, 2019
- Accepted: March 22, 2019
- Accepted Manuscript published: March 22, 2019 (version 1)
- Version of Record published: April 5, 2019 (version 2)
Copyright
© 2019, Cooper & Ritchey
This article is distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License permitting unrestricted use and redistribution provided that the original author and source are credited.
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