Not sure if this is the sort of thing you are looking for:

Fine, M. S., & Minnery, B. S. (2009). Visual salience affects performance in a working memory task. The Journal of Neuroscience, 29(25), 8016-8021.

Melcher, D., & Piazza, M. (2011). The role of attentional priority and saliency in determining capacity limits in enumeration and visual working memory. PloS one, 6(12), e29296.

There is a difference in static vs video, simply due to the previous processing steps, which may produce the salience difference. So if you are interested in the memory effect you need to balance the salience of the stimuli beforehand. The Emopics dataset has rated static images, but I am not aware this has been compared to video data. Just equating the presentation time (5 sec video clip and 5 sec static image) may not do the trick as people can divert looking at an awful image ... May need eye tracking to control for attention.

Thanks for this Melanie, I'll have a look. Our goal is to determine if there are nuanced, but clearly defined "parking places" within the brain for different visual medium memories. Whether we can one day connect this to the working memory consolidation process, will depend on if the tests show shifts in storage mechanisms based on the formatting type of visual information presented. If this turns out to be true, the implications would be significant in terms of knowing which type of visual information delivery system gives the information receiver a higher likelihood of recall. How educators package information for memory retention then becomes the pursuit. We have the studies on the effects of multi-channeling information. Now we want to see if "seeing is believing" depends on what we can remember from what we saw. Your contribution is really appreciated.

Thanks Gerit. One of the many controls is the formatting of the cue card on which the skill testing questions sit. We are using the same neutral subject to hold the prompt in all three visual mediums, and the "calculation window" is constant in all three domains. We are randomizing presentation order for obvious reasons. Is there such a thing as a "neutral" font? We addressed same case, same sized white cue card and same relationship to the person holding the card.

Question: Are you studying this from Neuronal networks or neuro cognition? The term parking places comes from Neuronal networks, but... let's see if this can be useful: http://web.mit.edu/tkonkle/www/PAPERS/Oliva_2010_SpaceChapter.pdf

http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0010945213000051

http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3156021/

http://books.google.com/books?hl=en&lr=&id=qkngRLlRio8C&oi=fnd&pg=PA1&dq=differences+static+vs+movement+images+visual+memory+brain+MRI&ots=y2Lzck-29T&sig=x62xHfB5mpUeWNDa5CJQvl4vqao#v=onepage&q&f=false

I'm not sure if this can be useful but here it goes: http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S1053811909013901

http://www.jneurosci.org/content/32/45/15952.short

http://www.karger.com/Article/FullText/335589

I hope one of them can be useful

Thanks Alma, neural networks. We anticipate some diffusion changes, but aren't sure how or if that might show up. It should be interesting.

You may find this review of research into haptics useful: http://dern2.acer.edu.au/dern/research-reviews/page/neuroscience-and-elearning

You will need to subscribe to DERN to view the full review but here is a summary: "Education has developed over the last two-hundred years with some fixed views about learning, for example, learning involves memory training through rote learning or drill-and-practice. More recently, educational research has moved to better understandings of the social and contextual perspectives of learning as distinct from the decontextualized learning of traditional education. The use of technology and device-based interactivity especially using haptics (touch screens) has provided a bridge between the work of cognitive scientists and neuroscientists who have developed new insights into learning based on scientific evidence. Notions that the functioning of the brain was fixed, or that learning styles, popular among educators, affected learning or that the brain was right-sided or left-sided for different tasks came unstuck when the plasticity of the brain was revealed. In the popular best seller The Brain That Changes Itself, Norman Doidge (2007) explained how research had shown that the brain changes itself with experience. In a new research report Neuroscience and technology enhanced learning published jointly by STELLAR and Futurelab, the links between elearning and neuroscience are outlined succinctly and precisely. States the report, ‘We know that the brain is plastic and that experience (including educational experience) can change its connectivity, function and structure’ (p. 21)." Hope this is useful - cheers, Irena White

I'd also be happy to introduce you to my husband Dr Gerald (Gerry) White who is the author of this and all other DERN reviews and is globally recognised as a learning technologies expert :-)

Thanks Irena. I've attached the University of Alberta study that is connected to the Doidge book. There is another aspect, the "predictive brain" and social learning which plays a part in whether the mind is observing or immersing. We believe social detachment or engagement may influence memory calculations on an unconscious level. That is Brown and Brune's work and I can pass that along if you'd like. Plasticity confirmed, was important as it demonstrated conclusively that adaptation isn't strictly behavioural. From a learning perspective, the frame from which information is gathered, should matter when it comes to memory. Single frame, moving frame, or frameless, each have their own specific characteristics that the mind must organize. There is in all likelihood a built-in expectation that develops with repeated use, so the question becomes: "Are some memory traces easier to access because of the context in which semantic information for calculation is delivered?"

I'm not familiar with Haptics, but I am familiar with research on multi-channel information delivery. More channels (series or parallel) quite literally generate larger (some have argued "richer") neural network responses. Our concern was not in discovering the one best information enhancer, but if/when learners are influenced (unconsciously we believe) by context when performing a literal task (i.e. 5x4+6-13=)

If visual context does not matter (we aren't sure what % of the population studied that will be) we would like to know. If visual context does matter to memory, then we can parse the data to see if there is some combination of frames that can be of added assistance for recall.

The Dern link is appreciated. If the folks in elearning have been working this question of comparison and have something they would like to pass along from a clinical research standpoint, that would be great.

Hi Dean - many thanks for the PDF - I have passed it on to Gerry. Your research is certainly very exciting.

I appreciate the article too, very good:)

I would like to share a couple of post of a blog, nothing really sophisticated http://talkingaboutneurocognitionandlearning.blogspot.com/2011/09/relationship-between-memory-and.html

http://talkingaboutneurocognitionandlearning.blogspot.com/2011/09/memory-and-language.html

And the last one is this: http://talkingaboutneurocognitionandlearning.blogspot.com/2011/09/how-do-we-remember.html

Thanks Alma, I'll have a look over the weekend. The social learning study I mentioned to Irena is attached. These executive/top down functions play a role in what is going on here. The observer being observed shifts contexts, and in most educational settings it is quite common that the learner as observer is also being observed. My sharing the article is to show that there is some strong evidence that prediction in any kind of social context (including clinical studies where subjects interact with other human beings) impacts focus.

an interesting aspect is the episodic component of your memory task. You will present a math task either static, as video or via a person. When testing four weeks later you may measure recall (episodic memory of person), as well as recognition in trials of static presentation. Check out: http://psycnet.apa.org/journals/bul/133/5/800.html

And there are individual differences in recall/recollection simply because some encode very visual and vivid whereas others abstract immediately (getting rid of all episodic information) - but that might be not what you are after ?!

Exactly! So in a population can we say how the semantic and the episodic intermingle from a memory standpoint. Moscovitch et. al. have done much work on this when looking at working memory. So the static, nested in the ???? - vivid autobiographical, or the literal?

Your project gets even more exciting ;-) In principle you can address how we transform memory from episodic to semantic, because some of your subjects will have very good memory (=high proportion of episodic) after 4 weeks, others less so, sure it is a cross-sectional rather then within-design, but it still will address how the brain regions involved in memory change over time and task. And I am not aware anyone has looked at these individual differences in temporal restructuring - everything else being equal. I guess you have some standard questionaires included in your design (cognitive styles etc)?

The cognitive styles question is an interesting one for me, as I'm not sure how/where it fits in with what we are trying to determine (there is some debate as to the need for inclusion amongst the group :). From what I've seen, identification of learning preference appears to have limited application when examining the question of how a memory gets catalogued (and I've been called out for making this claim, so anyone else who wants to show me I'm wrong can tell me why). When looking at the research on memory consolidation, it is as though (E)pisodic and (S)emantic get "Marked". In some ways we are trying to determine if E, S, ES, SE marking is or is not consciously part of the memory systemization effort. We know cataloguing based on chronology and hierarchy exists, or researchers wouldn't be able to easily identify why episodic memory has more robust traces. This is part of the continuing examination of automatic vs. mediated recall. The degree of each won't be solved in our work, but if it can shed some light on that memory transformation process Gerit highlighted, we'll feel as though we've used our resources effectively.

As a follow-up to the post of just over an hour ago, I was just reviewing the Futurelab.org document that Irena pointed me to (thanks again) and found this:

The division of people into left-brained and right-brained takes this misunderstanding one stage further. At the end of their extensive review, Coffield et al. [5] concluded there were no clear implications for pedagogy arising from any existing models of learning styles, and psychological research has labelled learning styles as ‘wasted effort’ [6].

5.Coffield, F., et al., Learning styles and pedagogy in post-16 learning: A systematic and critical review (Report no. 041543). 2004, Learning and Skills Research Centre: London.

6.Kratzig, G.P. and K.D. Arbuthnott, Perceptual learning style and learning proficiency: A test of the hypothesis. Journal of Educational Psychology, 2006. 98(1): p. 238-246.

I'm certainly not so provocative in stating my sense of 'usefulness' in understanding learning styles (I haven't read either of the citations. I also know many people who want to hold desperately to this idea), but as I mentioned above, where the cut-off point for executive function in long-term memory exists isn't really up for debate (by categorizing memories we perform an executive function). Labelling how executive functions are performed style-wise seems to be where the camps of thought are staking their ground (yes-label vs. no-there is no such thing as style)

The study of visual interface and memory is extensive. The potential for division by the observer into space and/or object oriented categories which in turn triggers automatic and/or mediated recall has us puzzled. Is there a natural observation participation shift that the mind performs even as the literal task remains constant?

Learning style is not the same as thinking style. My thought went more into the difference one knows from autism and schizophrenia research, i.e. weak central coherence (Chris and Uta Frith and colleagues) - people who are more visual, others more verbal. But thanks, I need to find time to read the mentioned papers as well.

Gerit, you might also like Allen Snyder's work. Very exciting stuff on why we should all be a little autistic :). The Aussies have lots of good research on the go.

Dean,

I have a background in Visual Psychophysics and currently work in transportation research. I am just finishing up a case study investigating different methods of instruction in driver education in a public high school. We implemented 3 conditions (one instructional method via book, one method of book plus a visual video supplement, and one method of book plus hands on experience with actual vehicles outside of the classroom). Our dependent variable was knowledge retention 8 weeks later. We are analyzing the results now, and i will get back to you when I know more about which method/approach resulted in better knowledge retention. Quick analyses indicate a couple of significant improvements with the video supplement and hands-on experience (hands-on showing the best improvement). I will get back to you on the specifics later.

Obviously this is somewhat related to what I think you are investigating. It is suggested that some people learn (code information into long-term memory) better depending on the method. However, it may be that the larger proportion of people retain knowledge through one method over another. The case study I am working on is very applied obviously, but it could shed some light on improved instruction techniques for the teenage population.

Also, we did some literature reviews looking at instructional methods that improve memory and performance. I will try and pull those references together and get them to you, I just don't have access to them at this time.

Stay tuned, hopefully they may be helpful for you.

~Andy

Greetings to all,

The summer has brought a great deal of information forward that we need prior to bringing subjects into the lab, not the least of which is the potential for a "molecular" explanation for why different environments generate different neural-biological responses to informational stimuli. We are in the midst of gathering what ever information we can on the role that protein folding may play, post, and as part of, the synthesizing of protein that has been shown to be related to the LTP phenomenon. As anyone reading this with some familiarity with the study of "chaperone and shock proteins" might guess, the effect of environment, and more importantly the effect of aggregating stimuli (visual vs. moving visual vs. moving visual+temperature+oxygen uptake+sound intensity+ + +, ) may be causing all kinds of interesting responses to the way LTP is modulated and thus how long term memories are affected at the synaptic level, and subsequently at the network level. A simple question we are now asking is: will we be influencing the development of "response proteins" that are specific to the circumstances the subject finds them self under, and does that have any bearing on the type and strength of the memory that is translated and later recalled?

We have a working understanding of the Functioning that results from protein folding, and have the literature on BSE effects including weak transcription codons, prions etc. Where we are looking for help is in determining if there is any recent work (the last 12 months) combining the research on memory trace development and the role that protein folding might play. It appears at this point that these related domains of cellular research may not have crossed paths, but then again, maybe they have and the search method we've employed needs to be re-visited. Anyone with resources that can keep us current would be of great help.