MODELLING SPATIAL RECALL, MENTAL IMAGERY AND NEGLECT
to appear in Advances in Neural Processing Systems 13, MIT Press, 2001.
Suzanna Becker and Neil Burgess
We present a computational model of the neural mechanisms in the
parietal and temporal lobes that support spatial navigation, imagery,
and episodic recall. Long term representations are stored in the
hippocampus, and are associated with local spatial and object-related
features in the parahippocampal region. Viewer-centered representations are
dynamically generated from long term memory in the parietal part of the model.
The model thereby simulates recall and imagery of locations and objects in
complex environments. After parietal damage, the model
exhibits hemispatial neglect in mental imagery that rotates with the
imagined perspective of the observer, as in the famous Milan Square
experiment reported by Bisiach and Luzatti \cite{bisiach-luzatti-78}.
Our model makes novel predictions for the neural
representations in the parahippocampal and parietal regions and
for behavior in healthy volunteers and neuropsychological patients.
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