School of Psychology, Pevensey Building, University of Sussex, Falmer, UK.
Cortex. 2017 Aug;93:155-165. doi: 10.1016/j.cortex.2017.05.016. Epub 2017 Jun 1.
Many theories of declarative memory propose that it is supported by partially separable processes underpinned by different brain structures. The hippocampus plays a critical role in binding together item and contextual information together and processing the relationships between individual items. By contrast, the processing of individual items and their later recognition can be supported by extrahippocampal regions of the medial temporal lobes (MTL), particularly when recognition is based on feelings of familiarity without the retrieval of any associated information. These theories are domain-general in that "items" might be words, faces, objects, scenes, etc. However, there is mixed evidence that item recognition does not require the hippocampus, or that familiarity-based recognition can be supported by extrahippocampal regions. By contrast, there is compelling evidence that in humans, hippocampal damage does not affect recognition memory for unfamiliar faces, whilst recognition memory for several other stimulus classes is impaired. I propose that regions outside of the hippocampus can support recognition of unfamiliar faces because they are perceived as discrete items and have no prior conceptual associations. Conversely, extrahippocampal processes are inadequate for recognition of items which (a) have been previously experienced, (b) are conceptually meaningful, or (c) are perceived as being comprised of individual elements. This account reconciles findings from primate and human studies of recognition memory. Furthermore, it suggests that while the hippocampus is critical for binding and relational processing, these processes are required for item recognition memory in most situations.
许多关于陈述性记忆的理论认为，陈述性记忆是由不同大脑结构支持的部分可分离过程支撑的。海马体在将项目和上下文信息绑定在一起以及处理项目之间的关系方面起着关键作用。相比之下，单个项目的处理及其随后的识别可以由内侧颞叶（MTL）的海马体以外的区域支持，特别是当识别基于熟悉感而无需检索任何相关信息时。这些理论是领域通用的，即“项目”可以是单词、面孔、物体、场景等。然而，有混合证据表明，项目识别不需要海马体，或者基于熟悉感的识别可以由海马体以外的区域支持。相比之下，有令人信服的证据表明，在人类中，海马体损伤不会影响对不熟悉面孔的识别记忆，而对其他几种刺激类别的识别记忆则受损。我提出，海马体以外的区域可以支持对不熟悉面孔的识别，因为它们被视为离散的项目，并且没有先前的概念关联。相反，海马体以外的过程不足以识别（a）以前经历过的项目，（b）具有概念意义的项目，或（c）被视为由单个元素组成的项目。这个解释调和了来自灵长类动物和人类的识别记忆研究的发现。此外，它表明，虽然海马体对于绑定和关系处理至关重要，但在大多数情况下，这些过程对于项目识别记忆是必需的。
