Cognitive Neuroscience of Memory

Very nice update on memory research with clear explanations of the use of more modern technologies and contrasts with older techniques as well as summaries of relevant experiments to demonstrate the evidence. The only complaint I might have would be the image sizes. I had to use a magnifying class frequently to see the detail. My eyes are getting old, so perhaps that's not relevant.

A fantastic read for anyone involved in the learning industry.

This is a fascinating book that both shows the current state of the art in neuroscience and the limitations of that art. The first curiosity here are the types of memory: Memory Explicit Memory Long-term Memory Episodic Memory Context Memory "Remembering" Recollection Semantic Memory Item Memory Working Memory Implicit Memory Skills Repetition Priming The book describes well the two major tools used to research the living brain: fMRI and ERPs. By using fMRI, it's possible to see which parts of the brain are lighting up when a person is performing a particular memory task. However, this exposes the central problem in current brain research and this excellent book manifests that exact issue. We now know where but not WHY. Beyond knowing which areas of the brain light up, we don't know enough to make that useful. Beyond the early parts, this book devolves into listing which areas of the brain light up for a particular memory task but beyond that, it's a mystery what's going on in that lit-up section of the brain. This book would have gotten 5 stars only if the story was better understood and not so ambiguous. Beyond that, there were two key insights: "Episodic Memory involves retrieval of what items comprised the event, where the event took place, and when the event occurred. Retrieval of such detailed what-where-when information requires mentally traveling back in time to the previously experienced event. Such mental time travel is a key component of episodic memories and is associated with the subject experience of 'remembering' rather than 'knowing'. Regarding the memories of animals, the following insight was given: "Some of the most compelling evidence that animals can have episodic memory stems from the discovery of memory replay in the hippocampus. Memory replay refers to the reactivation of brain activity associated with a previous experience in the correct temporal order. ... A study of bottlenose dolphins also showed evidence of memory replay during periods of sleep or rest. The dolphins heard recorded humpback whale sounds... The whale sounds are very different from the whistles and burst-pulsed vocalizations typically made by dolphins. Sounds from the dolphins were recorded during subsequent days and nights. It was found that the dolphins made whale-like sound productions, mostly at night but also during quiet restfulness while swimming slowly or floating. Such sounds were never observed before the dolphins heard the whale sounds."

The book pulls together a updated review of relevant literature and does have a nice discussion of most topics. However, the authors opinions, particularly about functional MRI being essentially equivalent to phrenology make me doubt there is no bias.