Neuroanatomical substrates involved in true and false memories for face
Abstract
We often mistake an unknown person for a familiar person because of the similarities in facial features. This phenomenon, known as false memory, has been investigated mainly using words, pictures, and shapes. Previous neuroimaging studies on false memory have shown that both true and false memories trigger a similar activation in the medial temporal lobe, suggesting that it plays a common role in both. However, no study to date has investigated neural substrates of false memories for faces. In the present fMRI study, we applied a modified version of the standard false memory paradigm, using morphed pictures of faces, to induce false memory in an MRI environment. We found that activity in the amygdala and orbital cortices was associated with the degree of familiarity of items. In particular, false responses to "lure" items evoked a level of activity in the amygdala between that evoked for correct or incorrect responses to "true" items. This indicates a possible role of the amygdala in false memory. A specific region in the anterior cingulate cortex was involved in false recognition; the activity being correlated to reaction times for the response types. These results suggest that the amygdala is involved in determining the relev...Continue Reading
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