Declarative memory

Declarative memory

What is declarative memory and how does it differ from nondeclarative memory? 

Declarative or explicit memories are facts and events that are available to consciousness.

They require awareness, allow conscious recollection, utilize the hippocampal system, and are the type of memory damaged in amnesia. Declarative memory can be either semantic or episodic. 

Semantic memory refers to fund of knowledge information, language usage, and practical knowledge, whereas episodic memory refers to memories that are localizable in time and space.

Autobiographical memories stored within the past few hours to few months are clinically termed as recent memory, whereas older memories dating from early childhood are termed as remote memory. Interestingly, source (contextual) memory is the knowledge of where and when something was learned and is a subtype of declarative memory.

Prospective (capacity for remembering to remember) memory and future episodic memory (creation of scenarios requiring drawing upon past experiences to guide what might happen in the future) are other subtypes of declarative memory. 

Nondeclarative or implicit memories are passively acquired. They do not require the hippocampal circuitry and are not consciously accessible.

One is unaware of them, they are inflexible, and they remain intact in amnesia. Examples are motor skill learning, such as learning to play golf through repetition, conditioning, priming, cognitive skill learning, and habit learning.

This system requires the cerebellum, basal ganglia, and association cortices. 

In healthy individuals, both systems work together.

In amnesia, implicit or nondeclarative learning remains intact; this fact can be utilized for rehabilitation.

Even patients with AD, for example, can learn through this system—the repetition of facts, rather than single presentations, may allow their storage.

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