Brain anatomy 1.7 - The Hippocampus
Today we will be exploring the hippocampus, which associates with episodic and semantic memories.
There are 3 cognitive processes that are mediated by the hippocampus - associative representation, sequential organisation and relational networking.
Associative representation -
This is based on the idea that our memory is deconstructed into a series of sequentially organised events of memory from an unique experience. For example, in one specific memory, you might remember details of yourself as well as others, this therefore suggests that our episodic memory work closely in association with other memories to create an unique and complete picture of our memory which involves association with other aspects.
Sequential organisation -
This reflects how our memory is organised into specific orders. This is demonstrated in a study with rats which are presented with 5 odours, and findings showed that rats with lesions in the hippocampus failed to identify odours presented in orders, but were able to recognised which odours were presented.
Relational networking -
This works on the basic that our mind forms basic of relations and networking with other features of memories in our brain, and consequentially making some sort of 'compromise' in order to present the optimal version of the memory - as each features have storage of specific aspects of the memory, the mediational processes allow an accurate representation of our unique experiences.
Ref:
Eichenbaum, Howard. “Hippocampus: Cognitive Processes and Neural Representations That Underlie Declarative Memory.” Neuron, vol. 44, no. 1, Sept. 2004, pp. 109–120, https://doi.org/10.1016/j.neuron.2004.08.028.