The UC Irvine Department of Neurobiology and Behavior will host guest speaker Dr. James Antony, Assistant Professor at California Polytechnic State University.

Making memories last: Factors that promote memory persistence

How do memories persist? In this talk, I will investigate various factors that promote long-term memory. First, I will show how moment-to-moment predictions made during perception – and errors in those predictions (surprises) – affect memory in laboratory and real-world settings. I have found that surprise affects neural responses and enhances memory for events that unfold on a variety of timescales, from short (seconds) to long (hours to months). Second, I will discuss how error within a computational model of the hippocampus can be used to explain the well-known benefits of distributing learning over time. And finally, I will demonstrate how relationships among stimuli at encoding allow one to create well-fortified, integrated memories that last. Cumulatively, these findings significantly contribute to understanding memory persistence, and they could aid in developing methods for improving learning in educational settings and in populations suffering from memory deficits.