The anterior medial hippocampus contributes to both recall and familiarity-based memory for scenes

Abstract

The hippocampus is usually associated with recall memory, whereas its contribution to familiarity-based memory is debated. Growing evidence support the idea that this structure participates to any cognitive process performed on scene representations. In parallel, differences in functional specialisation and cortical connectivity were found across the longitudinal and transverse axes of the hippocampus. Here we reanalysed functional MRI data from 51 participants showing stronger engagement of the hippocampus in recall, familiarity-based recognition and rejection, and visual discrimination, of scenes compared to single objects. A conjunction analysis between these four tasks revealed a set of occipital, medial temporal, posterior cingulate, and parietal regions, matching the scene construction network described in the literature. Crucially, we found that the anterior medial part of the hippocampus was consistently involved in all tasks investigated for scene stimuli. These findings support that the hippocampus can contribute to both recall and familiarity-based memory, depending on stimulus type. More generally, this bolsters the recent proposal that circumscribed regions within the hippocampus may underpin specific cognitive mechanisms.

Keywords: Familiarity; Hippocampus; Recall; Scene processing; fMRI.