Memory for incidentally learned categories evolves in the post-learning interval

Abstract
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Abstract

Humans generate categories from complex regularities evolving across even imperfect sensory input. Here, we examined the possibility that incidental experiences can generate lasting category knowledge. Adults practiced a simple visuomotor task not dependent on acoustic input. Novel categories of acoustically complex sounds were not necessary for task success but aligned incidentally with distinct visuomotor responses in the task. Incidental sound category learning emerged robustly when within-category sound exemplar variability was closely yoked to visuomotor task demands and was not apparent in the initial session when this coupling was less robust. Nonetheless, incidentally acquired sound category knowledge was evident in both cases one day later, indicative of offline learning gains and, nine days later, learning in both cases supported explicit category labeling of novel sounds. Thus, a relatively brief incidental experience with multi-dimensional sound patterns aligned with behaviorally relevant actions and events can generate new sound categories, immediately after the learning experience or a day later. These categories undergo consolidation into long-term memory to support robust generalization of learning, rather than simply reflecting recall of specific sound-pattern exemplars previously encountered. Humans thus forage for information to acquire and consolidate new knowledge that may incidentally support behavior, even when learning is not strictly necessary for performance.

Data availability

Anonymized data and code to reproduce the results presented here are available at https://osf.io/7y2nx/

The following data sets were generated

1. Gabay Y
2. Karni A
3. Holt L
(2022) Memory for Incidentally Learned Categories Evolves in the Post-Learning Interval
https://osf.io/xbavk/.

https://doi.org/10.31234/osf.io/a8ksm

Article and author information

Author details

Yafit Gabay

Department of Special Education, University of Haifa, Haifa, Israel

For correspondence
ygabay@edu.haifa.ac.il

Competing interests
The authors declare that no competing interests exist.

"This ORCID iD identifies the author of this article:" 0000-0002-7899-3044
Avi Karni

Sagol Department of Neurobiology, University of Haifa, Haifa, Israel

Competing interests
The authors declare that no competing interests exist.
Lori L Holt

Department of Psychology, Carnegie Mellon University, Pittsburgh, United States

Competing interests
The authors declare that no competing interests exist.

Funding

Binational Scientific Foundation (2015227)

Yafit Gabay
Avi Karni
Lori L Holt

The National Science Foundation-Binational Scientific Foundation (2016867,NSF BCS1655126)

Yafit Gabay
Avi Karni
Lori L Holt

The funders had no role in study design, data collection and interpretation, or the decision to submit the work for publication.

Ethics

Human subjects: The study was approved by the Institutional Review Board of the University of Haifa (no. 099/18) and was conducted in accordance with the Declaration of Helsinki. Written informed consent was obtained from all participants, who were compensated for their participation in the study

Copyright

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.