PT  - JOURNAL ARTICLE
AU  - Lu, Qihong
AU  - Hummos, Ali
AU  - Norman, Kenneth A.
TI  - Episodic memory supports the acquisition of structured task representations
AID  - 10.1101/2024.05.06.592749
DP  - 2024 Jan 01
TA  - bioRxiv
PG  - 2024.05.06.592749
4099  - http://biorxiv.org/content/early/2024/05/07/2024.05.06.592749.short
4100  - http://biorxiv.org/content/early/2024/05/07/2024.05.06.592749.full
AB  - Generalization to new tasks requires learning of task representations that accurately reflect the similarity structure of the task space. Here, we argue that episodic memory (EM) plays an essential role in this process by stabilizing task representations, thereby supporting the accumulation of structured knowledge. We demonstrate this using a neural network model that infers task representations that minimize the current task’s objective function; crucially, the model can retrieve previously encoded task representations from EM and use these to initialize the task inference process. With EM, the model succeeds in learning the underlying task structure; without EM, task representations drift and the network fails to learn the structure. We further show that EM errors can support structure learning by promoting the activation of similar task representations in tasks with similar sensory inputs. Overall, this model provides a novel account of how EM supports the acquisition of structured task representations.Competing Interest StatementThe authors have declared no competing interest.