Rapid changes in bodily and neural states affect learning

2018

Declarative memories consist of the past events and factual information that can be recalled. One of the most popular experimental paradigms used in studying long-term memory formation is classical conditioning. Trace conditioning is a hippocampus-dependent task where two separate sensory stimuli are presented in contingency but with a temporal gap between. In trace eyeblink conditioning a conditioned stimulus, usually a tone, is presented with a short silent period followed by an airpuff to the eye. In the beginning of the learning process the behavioral response to the airpuff is naturally a blink of an eye. After repeated trials the subject learns to shut the eyelid after perceiving the …