Chapter 12: Learning and Memory

This chapter introduced us the case of Alexander Luria’s patient, S. He was

amazingly gifted for being able to recall huge number of digits all at once. However,
despite of him being gifted about this aspect, he’s missing the ability of being able to
organize his knowledge using concepts, categories, and generalizations, and that is
somehow the aspects where normal people possesses.
This case has taught us that even though an individual is capable of doing
extraordinary things, that will never qualify a person as being perfect, there will always
be something missing, and that is the true essence of being human – nobody’s perfect,
it’s just a matter of how a person sees something in things that makes it perfect.

LEARNING
Like reflexes, instincts and learned behaviors are the 3 major categories of
organisms’ behavior. Reflexes refer to the involuntary responses to stimuli. Instincts are
automatic, but their resulting behaviors are more complex. Learning however is the
relatively permanent change in behavior due to experience, provides organisms with the
most flexible means for responding to the environment.

 Types of Learning
The two ways about how learning occurs are associative learning and
nonassociative learning. Associative learning occurs when an organism forms a
connection between two features of its environment. Nonassociative learning includes
the processes of habituation and sensitization which involves changes in the magnitude
of responses to stimuli rather than the formation of connections between specific
elements or events.

 Habituation and Sensitization

Habituation occurs when an organism reduces its response to unchanging,

harmless stimuli. Sensitization occurs when repeated exposure to a strong stimulus
increases response to other environmental stimuli.

 Classical Conditioning

Classical conditioning is where organisms learn that stimuli act as signals that
predict occurrence of other important events. Conditioned stimulus refers to an
environmental event whose significance is learned while unconditioned stimulus has
innate meaning to the organism. The conditioned responses are those behaviors that
must be learned, whereas unconditioned responses appear without prior experience
with a stimulus.

 Using Invertebrates to Study Learning

Invertebrates are capable of learning, but their large-celled, simple and easily
observed nervous systems also make them ideal subjects. Researchers have relied on
the sea slug, Aplysia californica. To understand learning processes in Aplysia, it is
helpful to know about its anatomy.

 Habituation in Aplysia

Invertebrates such as Aplysia have neural nets as opposed to brains. Within

these neural nets, ganglia or collection of cell bodies, serve as major processing
centers. Habituation in aplysia can last up to 3 weeks.

 Sensitization in Aplysia

In sensitization, a stimulus gains the ability to influence more than one neural
pathway. After Aplysia is synthesized by the administration of an electric shock to the
head or tail, touching the siphon results in an enhanced gill-withdrawal response.
Adjustments at the synaptic level account for the immediate changes we see in
habituation and sensitization.
 Classical Conditioning in Aplysia
Aplysia are also cabale of demonstrating associative learning in the form of
classical conditioning. A slight touch of the mantle shelf serves as the conditioned
stimulus (CS) and an electrical shock to the tail serves as the unconditioned stimulus
(UCS) and to provide a control stimulus that is not paired with shock, the siphon (CS) of
the Aplysia is occasionally touched, but not frequently enough to produce habituation.

 Classical Conditioning in Vertebrates

The emphasis in vertebrate conditioning is on postsynaptic processes such as
protein synthesis in the postsynaptic cells.
 Classical Conditioning of Fear

The amygdala is one of the parts that mainly play a role in the classical
conditioning of emotional responses. Lesion studies, recording studies and research
involving the administration of NMDA antagonists all point to the importance of the
amygdala in this type of learning. In the investigation of classically conditioned fear in
rats, a stimulus such as a tone, is followed by an electrical shock to the feet. The
conditioned response is a reduction in behaviors that are incompatible with fear such as
feeding. Following the pairing of shock with a tone, the tone by itself will begin to serve
as a danger signal that evokes fear and inhibits feeding. Information about the tone and
the shock converges in amygdala.
 Classical Conditioning of the Eyeblink
The mechanisms of classical conditioning in vertebrates comes from
investigation into conditioned eyeblinks in the rabbit by Richard Thompson and his
colleagues. In this preparation, a tone is followed by a puff of air directed at the rabbit’s
eye which causes movement of the rabbit’s nictitating membrane, an additional inner
eyelid found in some birds, fish and mammals but not in humans. Thompson and his
colleagues focused on a structure in the cerebellum known as the interpositus nucleus.
 Cerebellar Circuits and Classical Conditioning

In the cerebral cortex, the Purkinje cells receive inputs known as climbing fibers
from neurons located in the inferior olive in the medulla. Also, the Purkinje cells receive
input from parallel fibers and these fibers originate in an adjacent layer of cerebellar
cells known as granule cells.
 Trace Conditioning and Extinction
The classical conditioning in Aplysia, rabbits and humans was described by
Pavlov as delay conditioning. The conditioned stimulus in traditional delay conditioning
overlaps the unconditioned stimulus somewhat with no stimulus-free interval between
the CS and UCS. In trace conditioning, a stimulus-free interval occurs, and bridging the
interval requires more than just cerebellar activity alone.

MEMORY

 Types of Memory
Information processing models of memory assume that information flows through
a series of stages on its way to permanent storage in memory. According to the
Atkinson-Shiffrin model, any information sensed by an organism initially enters the
sensory memory. It is the first stage of memory that can hold a large amount of data for
a very brief period of time, on the order of a few seconds. Next, we select information
for further processing and move it to the next stage of memory, the short-term memory
or “working memory”.
The long-term memories are divided into 3 categories; semantic, episodic and
procedural memories. Semantic memory contains basic knowledge of facts and
language. Episodic memory relates to your own personal experience. Lastly, procedural
memory stores information about motor skills and procedures such as riding a bicycle,
using a software program, or cooking your favorite meal. The semantic and episodic
memory are grouped together as declarative memories.

 Brain Mechanism in Memory

 Early Efforts to Locate Memory Functions

One of the earliest psychologists to tackle the problem of locating the engram
was Karl Lashley. He reasoned that the engram might be located in the association
cortex, areas of cortex that are not locked into a specific sensory or motor function.
Lashley’s major contribution was his suggestion that memories are in fact distributed
across the cortex rather than stored in one specific location. Other investigators have
presented evidence for very specific.
 The Temporal Lobe and Memory
Significant evidence of the temporal lobe’s involvement in memory came from
case studies of patients with anterograde amnesia. Patients with anterograde appear to
retain their newly acquired procedural, implicit memories while experiencing a dramatic
deficit in their ability to form new explicit memories. One of the most thoroughly studied
cases of anterograde amnesia is a man known in the literature only as patient H.M. In
studying about the results of temporal lobe lesions on the memory performance of
rhesus monkeys, Mishkin and Squire used a memory task known as delayed
nonmatching to sample task.
 Long-Term Potentiation (LTP)
Researchers began to investigate neural mechanisms in the hippocampus that
appear to provide a basis for learning and memory. The hippocampus consists of a
gentle arc just medial to the lateral ventricle in each hemisphere. Ventral to the
hippocampus are the parahippocampal cortex and the rhinal cortex, which in turn is
made up of the entorhinal and perirhinal cortices. Input from the association areas of the
cortex enters the parahippocampal and rhinal cortices which in turn transmit the
information to the hippocampus. Output from the area generally travels along the fornix,
a pathway that terminates in the hypothalamus. In the hypothalamus, a folded structure
in the with two main layers of neurons is located. The first layer is what we call the
Ammon’s horn while the second is named dentate gyrus.
 LTP and Spatial Memory
Through the use of single-cell recordings, researchers have been able to
conclude that hippocampal spatial maps are formed within minutes of entering a new
environment. Several research approaches have been used to investigate links
between LTP and spatial memory, just like for example the genetic mutations can be
produced in the chemical pathways responsible for LTP.
 The Diencephalon and Memory
 The hippocampus and other areas of the temporal lobe are connected to the
thalamus. The disruptions of these areas may result to amnesia. The case studies
conducted with diencephalic lesions support the role of this area in memory. Chronic
alcoholics who develop Korsakoff’s syndrome experience anterograde amnesia similar
to that of patients H.M and N.A. Alcoholism often results in a deficiency of thiamine also
known as Vitamin B. The thiamine is very important to nervous system functioning
because it participates to in the synthesis of the neurotransmitter acetylcholine.
 Semantic Memory and the Cerebral Cortex
Evidence shows that our semantic knowledge, or our basic knowledge of facts
and language is widely distributed in the cortex.
 Episodic Memory and the Cerebral Cortex
Tulving’s concept of an independent episodic memory store for our own personal
experiences is supported by case studies with patients having cortical damage. Patients
who have these conditions experience memory deficits known as the source amnesia.
 Short-Term Memory and the Brain
Baddeley (1974, 2000) divided short-term memory or working memory into 4
components, a central executive, the phonological loop, the visuospatial scratchpad and
the episodic buffer. The dorsolateral prefrontal cortex and the anterior cingulate cortex
are believed to provide the neural basis for the central executive.
 The Striatum and Procedural Memory
The striatum, including the basal ganglia and nucleus accumbens are involved
with the formation of procedural memories. The basal ganglia are part of the motor
system so this structure is involved with the learning and memory of motor patterns. The
nucleus accumbens contributes an evaluation of emotion and reward to the learning of
procedures. The striatum not only encourages exploration but also participates in the
exploitation or the evaluation of changes leading to greater accuracy and reward. The
role of the striatum in procedural not in declarative memories were demonstrated by
observing the effects of lesions on rats trained in one of 2 different maze tasks.
 Biochemical Factors in Long-Term Memory
The binding of serotonin by the sensory neurons activate an enzyme, adenylyl
cyclase which in turn converts adenosine triphosphate into the second messenger cyclic
AMP. Subsequently, Camp activates protein kinase. Biochemical pathways of learning
can be modified through genetic manipulation.
 The Effects of Stress on Memory
Trauma is believed to influence memory. But according to Freud traumatic
memories can be repressed but in contrast, the memories of trauma in PTSD remains
vivid and intrusive. Stress effects on memory interact with the complexity of task. Many
researchers argued that stress uniformly impairs the formation of memory by inhibiting
the hippocampus, this approach is not consistent with substantial research showing that
LTP in the hippocampus is enhanced by emotions.
 Aging and Memory
Some aspects of learning and memory undergo age-related changes even in
healthy older adults. The stability in their cognitive ability might arise from modifications
in brain activity that compensate for age-related declines in brain function. As people
age, decreased blood flow is observed is many parts of the brain essential to memory
and cognition, especially in the frontal and temporal lobes.