Manipulation of hippocampal attentional state and its effect on memory: an rtfMRI investigation

Abstract

Previous work has found distinct patterns of activity all over medial temporal lobe (MTL), including hippocampus as well as other cortical areas, when subjects are attending to an art image versus a room image [Aly and Turk-Browne, 2016b], and that memory for these items is characterized by a greater difference between the CA23DG brain state match to art template and match to the room template during viewing of art images that are later remembered than during viewing of art images that are later forgotten, and vice versa for room images [Aly and Turk-Browne, 2016a]. This study seeks to expand upon that study by using real-time functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) to independently manip- ulate hippocampal brain states and examine its effect on memory in order to make a more causal claim about hippocampal attentional state's effect relevance to memory. Although subjects do not generally succeed at using neurofeedback, the memory effects of the previous experiment [Aly and Turk-Browne, 2016a] are tentatively replicated and extended.