The neural signature of prediction error dependent stress effects on the memory for surrounding events
Year: 2024
Type: preprint
Abstract: The effect of stress on the memory for events encountered before or after the stressful encounter has been widely studied. In general, the memory for information encountered before the stressor tends to be enhanced, while the findings for information encountered afterwards remain inconsistent, with findings indicating both enhancement and impairment (for a review, see Shields et al., 2017). However, stressful events enhance the memory for only some nearby events, while other events remain unaffected. What drives this selectivity remains unknown. According to the behavioural tagging hypothesis, initially weakly encoded information can be effectively consolidated, if a significant event occurs within a critical time window (Ballarini et al., 2009). Moreover, recently prediction errors (PE) were proposed to form a unique route to memory enhancement via arousal (Rouhani et al., 2023). In this study, we aim to investigate whether the impact of stress on the memory of events surrounding a stressor depends on the PE associated with these events. Participants will complete two image encoding tasks inducing varying levels of PE, during EEG recording. Between the tasks, they will undergo the Trier Social Stress Test (TSST) to induce a moderate level of stress (Kirschbaum et al., 1993), or a control treatment. The next day, participants will complete a recognition memory task for the encoded images. We will also assess the memory for the stressful encounter and track the psychological and physiological stress response via questionnaires and by measuring blood pressure, pulse and salivary cortisol. Importantly, the effect of PE on memory is not uniform. Many studies have found that PEs improve memory (Kalbe & Schwabe, 2020), but occasionally the opposite is also shown (Ortiz-Tudela et al., 2023). A recent review article proposed that PE-related memory enhancement may be contingent on the relevance of the PE for the task itself (Nolden et al., 2024). Specifically, if task performance benefits from correct predictions, PEs might not result in memory improvement (Huang et al., 2023). To test this idea, 20% of the trials will involve visual oddballs which are unrelated to the image stimuli themselves. Finally, throughout encoding, we will measure skin conductance and pupil dilation as these have been found to scale with PE.
Source: OSF Preprints (OSF Preprints)
Authors: Antonia Lilja, Lars Schwabe
Language: English
Topic: Memory and Neural Mechanisms
Subfield: Cognitive Neuroscience
Field: Neuroscience
Domain: Life Sciences
Open Access status: green
OpenAlex ID: W7113009932