Max Planck Research Group: Adaptive Memory, Max Planck Institute for Human Cognitive and Brain Sciences, Leipzig, Germany; International Max Planck Research School NeuroCom, Leipzig, Germany.
Max Planck Research Group: Adaptive Memory, Max Planck Institute for Human Cognitive and Brain Sciences, Leipzig, Germany; Berlin School of Mind and Brain, Humboldt-Universität zu Berlin, Berlin, Germany.
Cognition. 2022 Oct;227:105202. doi: 10.1016/j.cognition.2022.105202. Epub 2022 Jun 14.
Humans can vividly simulate hypothetical experiences. This ability draws on our memories (e.g., of familiar people and locations) to construct imaginings that resemble real-life events (e.g., of meeting a person at a location). Here, we examine the hypothesis that we also learn from such simulated episodes much like from actual experiences. Specifically, we show that the mere simulation of meeting a familiar person (unconditioned stimulus; US) at a known location (conditioned stimulus; CS) changes how people value the location. We provide key evidence that this simulation-based learning strengthens pre-existing CS-US associations and that it leads to a transfer of valence from the US to the CS. The data thus highlight a mechanism by which we learn from simulated experiences.
人类可以生动地模拟假设的体验。这种能力利用我们的记忆（例如，熟悉的人和地点）来构建类似于现实生活事件的想象（例如，在一个地点见到一个人）。在这里，我们检验了这样一个假设，即我们也可以从这种模拟情节中学习，就像从实际经验中学习一样。具体来说，我们表明，仅仅模拟在一个已知地点（条件刺激；CS）遇到一个熟悉的人（无条件刺激；US）就会改变人们对该地点的价值。我们提供了关键证据表明，这种基于模拟的学习增强了预先存在的 CS-US 关联，并导致效价从 US 转移到 CS。因此，这些数据突出了我们从模拟经验中学习的一种机制。
