Search PubMed⌕ Search

SEARCH · Search PubMed

Results for “representation learning”

Search indexed PubMed citations on genomics, clinical trials, systematic reviews and public health. Explore titles, authors and supplied subject terms, then open the PubMed record.

Quote a phrase for an exact phrase match. Source license links do not imply unrestricted reuse.

At least 1,765 records · Page 98Linked to original sources

Improvements in the signal-to-noise ratio of motor cortex cells distinguish early versus late phases of motor skill learning.

There are numerous experience-driven changes in cortical circuitry that correlate with improved performance. Improved motor performance on a reach-to-grasp task in rodents is associated with changes in long-term potentiation (LTP), synaptogenesis, and movement representations in primary motor cortex (M1) by training days 3, 7, and 10, respectively. We recorded single-cell activity patterns in M1 during reach-to-grasp training to test how neural-spiking properties change with respect to LTP, synaptogenesis, and motor map changes. We also tested how neural-spiking changes relate directly to improved performance by monitoring muscle activity patterns. We found that signal-to-noise ratios (SNRs) of M1 spiking were significantly improved with practice but only after 7-12 d. Three sources of noise were assessed: signal-dependent noise exemplified by the slope of the relationship between mean spike count and count variance per burst, signal-independent noise exemplified by the offset of this relationship, and background firing rates before and after bursts. Signal-independent noise and pre-burst firing rates were reduced with practice. Early performance gains (days 1-6) were dissociated from SNR improvements, whereas later performance gains (day 7-12) were related directly to the magnitude of improvement in both muscle recruitment reliability and success rates. With training, an increased number of cells exhibited firing rates that were correlated with muscle recruitment patterns, with lags suggesting a primary direction of influence from M1 to muscles. These results suggest a functional linkage from local synaptogenesis in M1 to improved spiking reliability of M1 cells to more reliable recruitment of muscles and finally to improved behavioral performance.

Action Potentials↗

Hypothesis-testing and nonlinguistic symbolic abilities in language-impaired children.

This study sought to clarify further the cognitive abilities of language-impaired children by examining their hypothesis-testing and nonlinguistic symbolic abilities. A discrimination learning task and a concept formation task were used to measure hypothesis-testing abilities, and a haptic (touch) recognition task was used to assess nonlinguistic symbolic abilities. Subjects were 10 language-impaired and 10 language-normal children matched for performance Mental Age. Measures of expressive and receptive language were also obtained from each child. The language-impaired children were found to perform significantly poorer than their MA controls on the haptic recognition task and on a portion of the discrimination learning task. No differences were found between the two groups' concept formation abilities. Correlational analyses revealed a particularly strong positive relationship between performance on the Peabody Picture Vocabulary Test and the haptic recognition tasks. It was speculated that this relationship was motivated by the symbolic demands of these tasks. One implication of this speculation is that a symbolic representational deficit might better explain the receptive language deficit than the expressive one.

Age Factors↗

Altered representation of the spatial code for odors after olfactory classical conditioning; memory trace formation by synaptic recruitment.

In the olfactory bulb of vertebrates or the homologous antennal lobe of insects, odor quality is represented by stereotyped patterns of neuronal activity that are reproducible within and between individuals. Using optical imaging to monitor synaptic activity in the Drosophila antennal lobe, we show here that classical conditioning rapidly alters the neural code representing the learned odor by recruiting new synapses into that code. Pairing of an odor-conditioned stimulus with an electric shock-unconditioned stimulus causes new projection neuron synapses to respond to the odor along with those normally activated prior to conditioning. Different odors recruit different groups of projection neurons into the spatial code. The change in odor representation after conditioning appears to be intrinsic to projection neurons. The rapid recruitment by conditioning of new synapses into the representation of sensory information may be a general mechanism underlying many forms of short-term memory.

Animals↗

Hippocampal function during behaviorally silent associative learning: dissociation of memory storage and expression.

In laboratory studies, the assessment of memory is typically associated with overt behavioral responses. Thus, it has been difficult to determine whether the enhancement of hippocampal sensory-evoked potentials that often accompany memory formation are the neurophysiological manifestation of a memory "trace" or are a secondary product of the behavioral expression of the memory. We addressed this issue by examining changes in evoked hippocampal field potentials during sensory preconditioning, a form of behaviorally silent relational learning that requires an intact hippocampus for execution. Rats were exposed to presentations of a white noise (S1) that terminated with a tone (S2). These pairings of ostensibly "neutral" stimuli supported no change in the behavior elicited by the noise. However, if the tone was subsequently paired with mild footshock (US), suppression of ongoing licking behavior (indicative of fear) was elicited by the noise, indicating that the animal had associated the noise with tone (S1-S2), and had represented the noise-tone-shock (S1-S2-US) relationship. Pre-training neurotoxic lesions of the hippocampus had no effect on conditioned suppression to tone after tone-shock (S2-US) pairings, but disrupted the expression of continued suppression to noise (S1) after tone-shock pairings. In a second experiment, sensory-evoked field potentials in the dorsal hippocampus were recorded with extracellular electrodes. No changes in the hippocampal response evoked by white noise were observed after pairings of noise and tone, i.e., no evidence for a memory trace could be detected. In contrast, after tone was paired with footshock, two short-latency negative potentials within the noise-evoked field response increased in amplitude, a response often presumed to reflect a neurophysiological correlate of memory storage. In total, these results suggest that although the hippocampus critically contributes to the processing of a behaviorally silent associative memory, there may be no role for changes in the amplitude of hippocampal sensory-evoked field potentials in storing representations of the relationships between sensory experiences.

Acoustic Stimulation↗

[Neurobiology of learning--the basis of an alteration process].

In contrast to the opinion that prevailed in the 1980es, there is now increasing evidence that the plasticity of the human brain, i. e. its remarkable ability to adapt to and change with experience, is, under normal conditions, a lifelong phenomenon. Representations of the environment are associated with activations and biochemical modifications in neuronal networks, which will be stabilized, modified or will wither in the course of cumulated experience. The capability to modify the biochemistry of synapses as well as the growth and change in terms of rewiring of synapses, dendritic branching and glial cell proliferation via the dialogue of synapses and genes, results in specific changes in neuronal connectivity and function. On the neurotransmitter level, glutamate and gamma-amino-butyric acid (GABA) as well as dopamine and serotonin, but also endorphin and encephalin, have a key position in this context. These neurotransmitter systems modulate neuronal plasticity on the neuronal level; on the behavioural level they influence affect, emotion, positive motivation and the correct evaluation of environmental stimuli. Experience, action as well as learning and memory are influenced by these systems. A basic thesis of this paper is that these mechanisms are involved in neuronal plasticity and that learning and memory are thus not only used and reused in structuring the CNS during the initial establishment of connections in the immature brain, in lifelong memory consolidation or the rewiring after brain damage, but can also be used to mould experience, learning und behaviour during psychotherapy and rehabilitation in adults.

Brain↗

A cognitive behaviorist approach to the study of animal behavior.

Traditional psychological approaches to animal learning and behavior have involved either the atheoretical behaviorist approach proposed by B. F. Skinner (1938), in which input-output relations are described in response to environmental manipulations, or the theoretical behaviorist approach offered by C. L Hull (1943), in which associations mediated by several hypothetical constructs and intervening variables are formed between stimuli and responses. Recently, the application of a cognitive behaviorist approach to animal learning and behavior has been found to have considerable value as a research tool. This perspective has grown out of E. C. Tolman's cognitive approach to learning in which behavior is mediated by mechanisms that are not directly observable but can be inferred from the results of critical experiments. In the present article, the author presents several examples of the successful application of the cognitive behaviorist approach. In each case, the experiments have been designed to distinguish between more traditional mechanisms and those mediated by hypothesized internal representations. These examples were selected because the evidence suggests that some form of active cognitive organization is needed to account for the behavioral results.

Animals↗

Lateralization of spatial learning in the avian hippocampal formation.

The authors investigated lateralization of spatial learning within the avian hippocampal formation (HF). In Experiment 1, homing pigeons (Columba livia) with unilateral lesions of the right or left HF were trained to locate a goal in a square room containing local landmarks and global room cues. All groups learned the task. During probe trials, when landmarks were rotated or removed, intact pigeons and left HF-lesioned pigeons relied exclusively on global room cues to locate the food goal. Pigeons with right HF lesions were the only group to demonstrably use the landmarks. The results suggest that the right HF is preferentially involved in the representation of global environmental space, whereas only the left HF may be sensitive to local landmarks for navigation.

Animals↗

An integrated model of meaning and sense activation and disambiguation.

A simulation of meaning and sense selection is presented. In the model, distributed representations are used for both unrelated meanings and related meaning senses; however, related meaning senses are assumed to be correlated. Related meaning senses are assumed to be learned associatively in similarly correlated contexts. Our model is sufficient to account for the contrasting results obtained in priming paradigms by Whitney, McKay, Kellas, and Emerson (1985) and Tabossi (1988).

Cognition↗

Representation of objective similarity among three-dimensional shapes in the monkey.

Humans have been recently shown to represent parameterized three-dimensional objects in a manner that preserves relative similarities (as measured by parameter-space distances) among the objects (Cutzu and Edelman 1996). We show that the representation of objects in the monkey visual system is similarly faithful to the parametric variation built into the stimulus set. A monkey (Macaca fuscata) performed a delayed matching-to-sample task with 28 images (4 views x 7 objects). Stimuli in each of the two experiments were seven computer-rendered parameterized animal-like shapes, arranged in a low-dimensional configuration (namely, a two-dimensional TRIANGLE) in a common 56-dimensional parameter space. The monkey's task was to match objects (not views). Each experiment lasted for 3-4 weeks after the introduction of the stimulus set to the subject. Error rates were entered into a 7 x 7 object confusion matrix and submitted to nonmetric multidimensional scaling (MDS). In both experiment 1 (mean correct rate 69.7%) and experiment 2 (mean correct rate 59.9%), the MDS solutions resembled closely the low-dimensional parameter-space patterns built into the stimuli, in the sense that the point corresponding to the central one in the original pattern was inside the other six points and that the order of the six points in angular positions around the center point was preserved. A simulation study showed that the resemblance could not be due to chance. These results demonstrate the possibility of veridical representation of parametric similarity among complex objects in the monkey.

Animals↗

Event-related potentials and the matching of familiar and unfamiliar faces.

Event-related potentials (ERPs) were recorded from one midline and three pairs of lateral sites while subjects made same/different judgements on sequentially presented pairs of familiar or unfamiliar faces. During the interval between the first and second face, a slow wave was more negative-going over the right than the left hemisphere, particularly when the faces were familiar. Following the second face, two regions of the waveforms were more negative-going when this face did not match the identity of its predecessor. In the early region (less than 160 msec), this effect was confined to posterior electrode sites and familiar faces. In the later region (greater than 250 msec), the match/non-match effect was widespread across the scalp and was evident for both familiar and non-familiar faces, although in the latency range 350-450 msec (encompassing the "N400" component), it was greater in magnitude in the case of familiar stimuli. It is suggested that the slow wave asymmetries reflect the engagement of short-term memory mechanisms lateralized to the right hemisphere. The match/non-match differences are thought to reflect multiple processes, including the modulation of the "N400" component. The sensitivity of this component to the familiarity manipulation is consistent with the hypothesis that the amplitude of N400 reflects an item's compatibility with currently activated memory representations.

Adult↗

Topographical disorientation following unilateral temporal lobe lesions in humans.

Studies of the non-human temporal lobe, particularly the hippocampus, confirm its significant role in learning and memory, particularly allocentric spatial mapping of the environment. The role of the human temporal lobes in topographical orientation was investigated by examining the formation of representations of a large-scale real-world environment after unilateral left and right temporal lobe surgery. Patients and normal control subjects viewed videotape presentations of overlapping routes through a novel urban area. Topographical orientation was then assessed across a range of parameters. Right temporal lobe lesions alone gave rise to deficits in making proximity judgements. However, on all other topographical orientation tasks both right and left temporal lobe lesion groups were impaired relative to the normal control group, but the two patient groups did not differ significantly from each other. These findings suggest that such is the nature of remembering and way-finding in the environment that the integrity of both human temporal lobes is required.

Adult↗

Undernutrition during the brain growth period of the rat significantly delays the development of processes mediating Pavlovian trace conditioning.

Pavlovian trace conditioning procedures allow one to assess the ability of animals to associate events that are temporally separated because the conditioned stimulus terminates prior to the occurrence of the unconditioned stimulus. We report that undernutrition during Postnatal Days 2-18 significantly delays the development of trace conditioning to a visual stimulus. Previously undernourished 20-day-old rats conditioned when no temporal interval separated the termination of the CS and US onset (0-s trace interval). However, it was not until the undernourished pups were 30 days old that they conditioned when the trace interval was 10 or 30 s. In contrast, control pups only 20 days old were able to condition when a 10-s trace interval separated the CS and US events, and 25-day-old control pups conditioned when the interval was either 10 or 30 s. These results suggest that undernutrition delays the development of processes that enable the rat to sustain a representation of a visual CS during the trace interval.

Animals↗

Reinstatement of latent inhibition following a reminder treatment in a conditioned taste aversion paradigm.

Reminder treatments have been shown to facilitate the retrieval of a variety of conditioned responses. Whether or not similar results would occur with an experimental paradigm which involves primarily memory for a stimulus, i.e., where no particular response is specified, is unclear. Accordingly, using Sprague-Dawley rats, we employed a latent inhibition paradigm with a long (10 days) retention interval between sucrose (CS) preexposure and sucrose-illness pairing (training). The results demonstrated a loss of latent inhibition following the 10-day retention interval suggesting "forgetting" of the CS preexposure. However, placing a single reminder exposure to the CS within the preexposure-to-training interval reinstated the preexposure effect. Controls indicated that in the absence of the initial preexposure the reminder per se did not produce latent inhibition. Thus, a reminder can reinstate a stimulus attribute (flavor representation) and explicit conditioned responses.

Animals↗

Dissociating perceptual and representation-based contributions to priming of face recognition.

Repetition priming of object identification refers to the phenomenon whereby experience with an object induces systematic changes in subsequent processing of that same object. This data-driven form of priming is distinct from conceptually-driven priming. To date, considerable controversy exists about whether data-driven priming reflects facilitation in perceptual processing or mediation by preexisting object representations. The present study concerned priming of recognizing familiar and unfamiliar faces and how this priming is influenced by face inversion, which interferes with perceptual face processing. Perceptual and representation-based loci conjointly contributed to priming; the perceptual locus was operative similarly for familiar and unfamiliar faces, whereas the representation-based locus was only invoked for familiar faces and resulted in a response-time reduction triple the magnitude of that from the perceptual locus. The results constrain theoretical accounts of data-driven priming by indicating that improved identification can result from the combination of perceptual and representation-based facilitation.

Adult↗

Mental representation of number in different numerical forms.

How are numerical operations implemented within the human brain? It has been suggested that there are at least three different codes for representing number: a verbal code that is used to manipulate number words and perform mental numerical operations (e.g., multiplication), a visual code that is used to decode frequently used visual number forms (e.g., Arabic digits), and an abstract analog code that may be used to represent numerical quantities. Furthermore, each of these codes is associated with a different neural substrate. We extend these studies using dense-sensor event-related EEG recording techniques to investigate the temporal pattern of notation-specific effects observed in a parity judgement (odd versus even) task in which single numbers were presented in one of four different numerical notations. Contrasts between different notations demonstrated clear modulations in the visual evoked potentials (VEP) recorded. We observed increased amplitudes for the P1 and N1 components of the VEP that were specific to Arabic numerals and to dot configurations but differed for random and recognizable (die-face) dot configurations. These results demonstrate clear, notation-specific differences in the time course of numerical information processing and provide electrophysiological support for the triple-code model of numerical representation.

Adolescent↗

Precise timing accounts for posttraining sleep-dependent enhancements of the auditory mismatch negativity.

Memory consolidation is a long-lasting dynamic process by which new acquired information is transformed at different analysis levels, from molecules to cognition, without additional practice. Results from a previous study on event-related potentials (ERPs) suggest that part of the neural events promoting changes in the electrophysiological correlates of enhanced automatization in a sound discrimination task occur during sleep. These data were reanalyzed in the present study at the single-trial level, and results indicated that the first night of sleep succeeding training is absolutely required to improve the timing consistency of cortical neural assemblies involved in automatic sound-change detection, as revealed by a significant reduction in the latency-jitter of the MMN response across trials. This change in the regularity of the brain response to previously trained sounds facilitated involuntary switch of attention towards the same sounds when they were task irrelevant, as reflected by the P3a emergence after posttraining sleep. Both responses were, however, prevented in subjects deprived of sleep the night following training in the sound discrimination task. We hypothesize that the reduction in the MMN latency-jitter, which, in turn, triggered an automatic shift of attention, might result from a change in synaptic efficacy and/or neural excitability, rather than from changes in firing synchronization and/or size of representation.

Acoustic Stimulation↗

How language acquisition builds on cognitive development.

When children acquire a first language, they build on what they know--conceptual information that discriminates and helps create categories for the objects, relations and events they experience. This provides the starting point for language from the age of 12 months on. So children first set up conceptual representations, then add linguistic representations for talking about experience. Do they then discard earlier conceptual representations in favour of linguistic ones, or do they retain them? Recent research on the coping strategies that young children (and adults) rely on when they are unable to draw on language suggest that they retain both types of representations for use as needed.

Child↗

Memory for what it is and memory for what it means: a single case of Korsakoff's amnesia.

A single case of Korsakoff's syndrome, showing classic circumscribed amnesia on traditional neuropsychological tests, performed a number of learning tasks previously used in primates to demonstrate the different anatomical basis of memory systems used to learn about the properties of objects or to learn about rules of responding. The patient (CJ) performed in a manner very similar to lesioned monkeys in that he could learn evaluative tasks (e.g. a red object is nice), but not rule based tasks (e.g. a red object means go left). In consequence CJ learned an object discrimination task in a manner qualitatively different from a group of non-amnesic controls. Although he could not learn rule based tasks, CJ could perform them once he had been given the rule. Detailed analysis of learning showed that CJ could choose the object he had chosen previously, but could not say where it had been or whether he had been rewarded. Furthermore he could recognise a word as familiar, while not remembering its source. We propose that he has a specific impairment in a memory system concerned with the representation of the signification of objects in particular contexts, while representation of the properties of objects remains intact.

Alcohol Amnestic Disorder↗