Eight Weddings and Six Funerals: An fMRI Study on Autobiographical Memories.

Francesca Benuzzi,Fausta Lui,Andrea Leo,Emiliano Ricciardi,Pietro Pietrini,Paolo Frigio Nichelli,Luca Cecchetti,Giuseppe Sartori,Daniela Ballotta,Paolo Papale,Giacomo Handjaras,Maria Angela Molinari,Michaela Zucchelli

doi:10.3389/fnbeh.2018.00212

Abstract

“Autobiographical memory” (AM) refers to remote memories from one's own life. Previous neuroimaging studies have highlighted that voluntary retrieval processes from AM involve different forms of memory and cognitive functions. Thus, a complex and widespread brain functional network has been found to support AM. The present functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) study used a multivariate approach to determine whether neural activity within the AM circuit would recognize memories of real autobiographical events, and to evaluate individual differences in the recruitment of this network. Fourteen right-handed females took part in the study. During scanning, subjects were presented with sentences representing a detail of a highly emotional real event (positive or negative) and were asked to indicate whether the sentence described something that had or had not really happened to them. Group analysis showed a set of cortical areas able to discriminate the truthfulness of the recalled events: medial prefrontal cortex, posterior cingulate/retrosplenial cortex, precuneus, bilateral angular, superior frontal gyri, and early visual cortical areas. Single-subject results showed that the decoding occurred at different time points. No differences were found between recalling a positive or a negative event. Our results show that the entire AM network is engaged in monitoring the veracity of AMs. This process is not affected by the emotional valence of the experience but rather by individual differences in cognitive strategies used to retrieve AMs.

Highlights

The expression Autobiographical memory (AM) refers to remote memories from one’s own life which are characterized by a sense of subjective time, autonoetic awareness (Tulving, 2002), and feelings of emotional re-experience (Tulving, 1983; Tulving and Markowitsch, 1998)
As a matter of fact, neuropsychological studies support the functional dissociation between these memories: patients with medial temporal lobe lesions are defective in AM recall, but not in semantic memory tasks (Vargha-Khadem et al, 1997; Tulving and Markowitsch, 1998; Gadian et al, 2000)
With respect to AM, functional neuroimaging studies focused on voluntary retrieval processes that involve different forms of memory and cognitive functions

Summary

Introduction

The expression Autobiographical memory (AM) refers to remote memories from one’s own life which are characterized by a sense of subjective time, autonoetic awareness (Tulving, 2002), and feelings of emotional re-experience (Tulving, 1983; Tulving and Markowitsch, 1998). Retrieval From Autobiographical Memory systems of memory, each specialized in processing distinct types of information (Vargha-Khadem et al, 1997; Cipolotti and Maguire, 2003) and subserved by distinct, functionally independent neural networks (Gabrieli, 1998; Cabeza and Nyberg, 2000; Tulving, 2002). As a matter of fact, neuropsychological studies support the functional dissociation between these memories: patients with medial temporal lobe lesions are defective in AM recall, but not in semantic memory tasks (Vargha-Khadem et al, 1997; Tulving and Markowitsch, 1998; Gadian et al, 2000). The retrieved memory content typically includes emotions and visual images, and is mediated by inferential and monitoring cognitive processes (Cabeza and St Jacques, 2007)

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