Shvyrkov's Lab. Neural Bases of Mind, Institute of Psychology, Russian Academy of Sciences, Moscow, Russia.
Faculty of Psychology, National Academic University of Humanities, Moscow, Russia.
Adv Neurobiol. 2024;41:3-38. doi: 10.1007/978-3-031-69188-1_1.
Despite the years of studies in the field of systems neuroscience, the functions of neural circuits and behavior-related systems are still not entirely understood. The systems description of brain activity has recently been associated with cognitive concepts, e.g., a cognitive map, reconstructed via place-cell activity analysis and the like, and a cognitive schema, modeled in consolidation research. The issue we find of importance is that cognitive concepts reconstructed in neuroscience research are mainly formulated in terms of the environment. In this chapter, we present the idea of an element of individual experience that serves as a model of behavioral interaction with the environment, rather than a model of the environment itself. This intangible difference entails the need for substantial revision of several well-known phenomena, including long-term potentiation. The principal questions we address are: how do elements of experience appear and change during learning and performance; and how do the links between these elements create the whole structure of individual experience? We argue that learning and memory research need a clear distinction between processes that provide the emergence of new elements of experience (functional systems) and processes underlying the retrieval and/or changes in the existing experience. We propose to view the activity of a neuron as an "action" directed to the future adaptive "microresult," essential for meeting its metabolic needs. This anticipatory neuronal activity is coordinated with the activity of many other cells of the body in the organism-wide functional system, ensuring the achievement of an adaptive "macroresult" at the behavioral level. From this perspective, the mechanisms of learning are considered as the formation of functional systems, and memory is considered as a dynamic structure constituted by systems formed at different stages of individual development.
尽管系统神经科学领域已经进行了多年的研究，但神经回路和与行为相关的系统的功能仍未完全被理解。大脑活动的系统描述最近与认知概念相关联，例如，通过位置细胞活动分析等方法重建的认知图，以及在巩固研究中建模的认知图式。我们发现一个重要的问题是，神经科学研究中重建的认知概念主要是根据环境来制定的。在本章中，我们提出了一个个体经验元素的概念，该元素作为与环境进行行为交互的模型，而不是环境本身的模型。这种无形的差异需要对几个著名的现象进行实质性的修订，包括长时程增强。我们要解决的主要问题是：经验元素在学习和表现过程中是如何出现和变化的；以及这些元素之间的联系如何创造出个体经验的整体结构？我们认为，学习和记忆研究需要在提供新的经验元素（功能系统）出现的过程和支持现有经验检索和/或变化的过程之间进行明确区分。我们建议将神经元的活动视为一种针对未来适应性“微观结果”的“行动”，这对于满足其代谢需求至关重要。这种预期的神经元活动与身体中许多其他细胞的活动在整个生物体的功能系统中协调一致，确保在行为水平上实现适应性的“宏观结果”。从这个角度来看，学习的机制被视为功能系统的形成，而记忆则被视为由在个体发展的不同阶段形成的系统构成的动态结构。
