Meadow voles, Microtus pennsylvanicus, have the capacity to recall the “what”, “where”, and “when” of a single past event

Ferkin, Michael H.; Combs, Amy; delBarco‐Trillo, Javier; Pierce, Andrew A.; Franklin, Stan

doi:10.1007/s10071-007-0101-8

Cited by 95 publications

(58 citation statements)

References 42 publications

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“…In later writings, Clayton and colleagues emphasize that for a What-Where-When (WWW) paradigm to be considered to be testing something resembling episodic memory, the memory demonstrated must be integrated (i.e., the what, where, and when elements must form a single representation) and should be able to be used flexibly to guide behavior (i.e., the subject should represent the event, not a fixed response rule or intention based on the event [Clayton et al 2003a,b]). Over the past 15 years, the WWW test has been used extensively to assess "episodic-like" memory in the animal cognition literature (e.g., Clayton and Dickinson 1998;Hampton et al 2005;Babb and Crystal 2006;Naqshbandi et al 2007;Ferkin et al 2008;Zinkivskay et al 2009;Martin-Ordas et al 2010). …”

Section: Methods Of Assessing Episodic Memorymentioning

confidence: 99%

Do different tests of episodic memory produce consistent results in human adults?

Cheke

Clayton

2013

Learn. Mem.

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A number of different philosophical, theoretical, and empirical perspectives on episodic memory have led to the development of very different tests with which to assess it. Although these tests putatively assess the same psychological capacity, they have rarely been directly compared. Here, a sample of undergraduates was tested on three different putative tests of episodic memory (What-Where-When, Unexpected Question/Source Memory, and Free Recall). It was predicted that to the extent to which these different tests are assessing the same psychological process, performance across the various tests should be positively correlated. It was found that not all tests were related and those relationships that did exist were not always linear. Instead, two tests showed a quadratic relationship, suggesting the contribution of multiple psychological processes. It is concluded that not all putative tests of episodic cognition are necessarily testing the same thing.

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Section: Methods Of Assessing Episodic Memorymentioning

confidence: 99%

Do different tests of episodic memory produce consistent results in human adults?

Cheke

Clayton

2013

Learn. Mem.

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“…A recent study suggests that meadow voles (Microtus pennsylvanicus), too, have a similar capacity ( Ferkin et al 2008). Male voles were first allowed to explore two chambers, one containing a pregnant female 24 hours pre-partum, and the other containing a female that was neither lactating nor pregnant.…”

Section: Uniquely Human?mentioning

confidence: 99%

Mental time travel and the shaping of the human mind

Suddendorf

Addis

Corballis

2009

Phil. Trans. R. Soc. B

281

103

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Episodic memory, enabling conscious recollection of past episodes, can be distinguished from semantic memory, which stores enduring facts about the world. Episodic memory shares a core neural network with the simulation of future episodes, enabling mental time travel into both the past and the future. The notion that there might be something distinctly human about mental time travel has provoked ingenious attempts to demonstrate episodic memory or future simulation in nonhuman animals, but we argue that they have not yet established a capacity comparable to the human faculty. The evolution of the capacity to simulate possible future events, based on episodic memory, enhanced fitness by enabling action in preparation of different possible scenarios that increased present or future survival and reproduction chances. Human language may have evolved in the first instance for the sharing of past and planned future events, and, indeed, fictional ones, further enhancing fitness in social settings.

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“…Recent studies with nonhuman animals (6)(7)(8)(9)(10)(11)(12)(13)(14)(15)(16)(17)(18) suggest that animals remember specific episodes from their past (i.e., whatwhere-when memories). However, controversy has emerged about the comparability of episodic-like memory in rodents and episodic memory in humans (17).…”

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confidence: 99%

Evidence for remembering when events occurred in a rodent model of episodic memory

Zhou

Crystal

2009

Proc. Natl. Acad. Sci. U.S.A.

111

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The content of episodic memory consists of representations of unique past events. Episodic memories are grounded in a temporal framework (i.e., we remember when an event occurred). It has recently been argued that episodic-like memory in rats is qualitatively different from human episodic memory because, rather than remembering when an earlier past event occurred, rats used the cue of how long ago it occurred. We asked, therefore, whether rats remember the time of day at which they encountered a distinctive event, in addition to what occurred and where it happened. Rats were tested in the morning and afternoon, on separate days. A distinctive flavor (chocolate) was replenished at a daily-unique location at only one of these times. The interval between first and second daily opportunities to eat (study and test, respectively) was constant. Rats adjusted their revisits to the chocolate location at different times of day by using time of day rather than the cue of how long ago an event occurred. Two lines of evidence suggest that rats remembered the time at which the distinctive event occurred. First, under conditions in which the time of test (but not time of study) was novel, rats immediately transferred their knowledge of the chocolate contingency to the new test time. Second, under conditions in which predictions for study and test times were put in conflict, rats again used study time. Our results suggest that, at the time of memory assessment, rats remember when a recent episode occurred, similar to human episodic memory. P eople remember when a past event occurred within the time frame of hours, days, or years (1). It has been argued that retrieval of episodic memories is analogous to traveling back in time to experience specific events from one's personal past (2-4). An earlier definition focused on the content of episodic memory, that is, answering 3 questions about a specific event: what happened, where did it take place, and when did it transpire (5)? We refer to this type of content as what-where-when memory. Clayton and Dickinson (6) introduced the term episodic-like memory to emphasize that behavioral studies in animals evaluate the content of episodic memory rather than subjective experiences.Recent studies with nonhuman animals (6-18) suggest that animals remember specific episodes from their past (i.e., whatwhere-when memories). However, controversy has emerged about the comparability of episodic-like memory in rodents and episodic memory in humans (17). Roberts et al. (2,17) suggested that memory for when an event occurred suggests an ability akin to mentally traveling in time to locate an event within a temporal framework; such an ability would be similar to human episodic memory, in which people reconstruct past experiences using an absolute temporal dimension (1,19,20). By contrast, a judgment of how long ago an event occurred is quite different from human episodic memory. Such a judgment could also be solved by simpler alternative mechanisms (e.g., timing an interval since a distinctive event ...

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Meadow voles, Microtus pennsylvanicus, have the capacity to recall the “what”, “where”, and “when” of a single past event

Cited by 95 publications

References 42 publications

Do different tests of episodic memory produce consistent results in human adults?

Do different tests of episodic memory produce consistent results in human adults?

Mental time travel and the shaping of the human mind

Evidence for remembering when events occurred in a rodent model of episodic memory

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