Reviews and perspectivesRole of parietal regions in episodic memory retrieval: The dual attentional processes hypothesis
Section snippets
Three hypotheses on the role of parietal cortex and episodic retrieval
The review by Wagner et al. (2005) considered three hypotheses on the role of parietal regions in episodic retrieval. First, the output buffer hypothesis postulates that parietal regions hold retrieved information in a form accessible to decision-making processes, similarly to one of Baddeley's working memory buffers. Second, the mnemonic accumulator hypothesis posits that parietal regions temporally integrate a memory-strength signal. Wagner et al. (2005) linked this idea to signal-detection
Functional neuroimaging evidence
As noted above, activations in lateral parietal cortex are among the most frequent findings in PET and fMRI studies of episodic retrieval (Cabeza & Nyberg, 2000; Rugg & Henson, 2002). Although summarizing the results of many of these studies can be very useful to identify basic patterns of parietal activity during episodic retrieval, as illustrated by the meta-analysis of Vilberg and Rugg (2008), these basic patterns can be accommodated by several competing hypotheses. For example, Vilberg and
Lesion evidence
Although functional neuroimaging evidence that parietal regions are frequently activated during episodic retrieval suggests that these regions play an important role in episodic retrieval, this idea is challenged by neuropsychological evidence that parietal lesions do not typically yield severe episodic memory deficits. Yet, if the contributions of parietal regions to episodic retrieval are related to their role in attention, then severe episodic memory deficits should not be expected. In
Open questions
Before concluding, it is important to consider several open questions regarding the DAP hypothesis. These include questions about (1) the overlap of activations in episodic retrieval and attention studies, (2) the domains of functional neuroimaging evidence accounted for by the DAP hypothesis, and (3) potential future extensions of the DAP hypothesis.
Conclusions
In sum, the present article introduced a new hypothesis regarding the contributions of parietal regions to episodic retrieval. According to this DAP hypothesis, DPC contributes top-down attentional processes guided by retrieval goals, whereas VPC contributes bottom-up attentional processes captured by the retrieval output. Although different, these processes interact very closely: goals determine the relevancy of incoming information and incoming targets may alter behavioral goals. The DAP
Acknowledgements
Special thanks to Marian Berryhill, Nancy Dennis, Scott Hayes, Morris Moscovitch, Lars Nyberg, Ingrid Olson, Michael Rugg, Kaia Vilberg, and three anonymous reviewers for insightful comments. This work was funded by NIH grants AG19731 and AG23770.
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