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Image: LiveScience |
Scientists have long suspected that the brain stores memories of an event in various locations, rather than at a single point. A recent study has provided solid evidence for this theory.
The research, conducted on mice, is believed to also apply to humans.
“This is the first time we have found ‘fragments’ in the brain related to an event that was previously thought to be a single memory,” said James McGaugh, a neuroscientist at the University of California, Irvine.
“For instance, different data from an event, such as a car accident, will be processed in different areas of the brain,” McGaugh explained. “Memories are dispersed throughout our brains, even though we perceive them as a singular event.”
In the experiment, each mouse was shocked while a pill was inserted into three different areas of its brain. Two days later, their memory of this distressing event was tested, and the pills revealed which parts of the brain were active.
The findings indicate that the hippocampus processes contextual memories, while the prefrontal cortex stores information about unpleasant stimuli, and the amygdala reinforces general memory and influences the recall of both unpleasant information and context.
“The more we understand about the specialization of memory, the more we can grasp why and how the memory processing can become distorted – the cause of pathological issues related to various types of cognitive distortions,” said Thomas Carew, Chair of the Department of Neurobiology and Behavior at the university.
