The findings shed light on how the hippocampus contributes to memory and exploration, potentially leading to therapies that restore hippocampal function, which is impacted in memory-related aging and neurodegenerative diseases such as dementia, the study authors said.
In the study, scientists monitored participants' brain activity and tracked their eye movements while looking at different complex pictures. The scientists discovered that as we visually scan our environment and absorb new information, our hippocampus becomes activated, using short-term memory to better process new visual information to help us rapidly reevaluate situations.
[...] "At any given moment, your brain rapidly initiates eye movements that you are typically unaware of," said corresponding author James Kragel, a postdoctoral research fellow at Northwestern University Feinberg School of Medicine. "Our findings suggest the hippocampus uses memory to inform where your eyes look, thereby priming the visual system to learn and reevaluate our environment on the fly.
Journal Reference:
James E. Kragel, Stephan Schuele, Stephen VanHaerents, et al. Rapid coordination of effective learning by the human hippocampus [open], Science Advances (DOI: 10.1126/sciadv.abf7144)
(Score: 0, Funny) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday June 19 2021, @11:43AM
I started reading this boring article, and my hippocampus made me look at the pinup calendar on the wall.
(Score: 2, Interesting) by HammeredGlass on Saturday June 19 2021, @06:14PM
As the hippocampus is one thing that is negatively affected by the usage of marijuana or its derivatives.
(Score: 2, Insightful) by js290 on Sunday June 20 2021, @04:19AM (1 child)
"Survival comes first, truth, science, and understanding later..." [medium.com]
(Score: 2, Disagree) by hendrikboom on Sunday June 20 2021, @01:35PM
Intuition evolved to promote our survival in an environment that is different from the one we live in now.
As out current environment is built using science explicitly, we now need science to navigate it.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Monday June 21 2021, @05:41AM
It's generally known that the purpose of human memory is not to remember the past, but to predict the future. That's one of the reasons we do not store information on past events like computers do. The research reported in this article did not just "discover" this fact, it is instead about the role of the hippocampus in short term memory formation.