Hostname: page-component-76d6cb85b7-rxvq6 Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2026-07-13T11:53:27.043Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false
  • English
  • Français

An adaptive function of mental time travel: Motivating farsighted decisions

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  22 January 2018

Roland G. Benoit ,
Ruud M. W. J. Berkers  and
Philipp C. Paulus
Roland G. Benoit
Affiliation:
Max Planck Research Group – Adaptive Memory. rbenoit@cbs.mpg.de berkers@cbs.mpg.de http://www.cbs.mpg.de/independent-research-groups/adaptive-memory
Ruud M. W. J. Berkers
Affiliation:
Max Planck Research Group – Adaptive Memory. rbenoit@cbs.mpg.de berkers@cbs.mpg.de http://www.cbs.mpg.de/independent-research-groups/adaptive-memory
Philipp C. Paulus
Affiliation:
Max Planck Research Group – Adaptive Memory. rbenoit@cbs.mpg.de berkers@cbs.mpg.de http://www.cbs.mpg.de/independent-research-groups/adaptive-memory International Max Planck Research School on Neuroscience of Communication, Max Planck Institute for Human Cognitive and Brain Sciences, 04103 Leipzig, Germany. paulus@cbs.mpg.de
Get access Rights & Permissions [Opens in a new window]

Abstract

The episodic memory system allows us to experience the emotions of past, counterfactual, and prospective events. We outline how this phenomenological experience can convey motivational incentives for farsighted decisions. In this way, we challenge important arguments for Mahr & Csibra's (M&C's) conclusion that future-oriented mental time travel is unlikely to be a central function of episodic memory.

Information

Type
Open Peer Commentary
Information
Behavioral and Brain Sciences , Volume 41 , 2018 , e3
Copyright
Copyright © Cambridge University Press 2018 

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

Article purchase

Temporarily unavailable

References

Addis, D. R., Wong, A. T. & Schacter, D. L. (2007) Remembering the past and imagining the future: Common and distinct neural substrates during event construction and elaboration. Neuropsychologia 45(7):1363–77. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.neuropsychologia.2006.10.016.Google Scholar
Addis, D. R., Wong, A. T. & Schacter, D. L. (2008) Age-related changes in the episodic simulation of future events. Psychological Science 19(1):33–41. https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1467-9280.2008.02043.x.Google Scholar
Benoit, R. G., Gilbert, S. J. & Burgess, P. W. (2011) A neural mechanism mediating the impact of episodic prospection on farsighted decisions. The Journal of Neuroscience 31(18):6771–79. Available at: https://doi.org/10.1523/JNEUROSCI.6559-10.2011.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Benoit, R. G. & Schacter, D. L. (2015) Specifying the core network supporting episodic simulation and episodic memory by activation likelihood estimation. Neuropsychologia 75:450–57. Available at: https://doi.org/10.1016/j.neuropsychologia.2015.06.034.Google Scholar
Boyer, P. (2008) Evolutionary economics of mental time travel? Trends in Cognitive Sciences 12(6):219–24. Available at: https://doi.org/10.1016/j.tics.2008.03.003.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Busby, J. & Suddendorf, T. (2005) Recalling yesterday and predicting tomorrow. Cognitive Development 20(3):362–72. Available at: https://doi.org/10.1016/j.cogdev.2005.05.002.Google Scholar
Camille, N., Coricelli, G., Sallet, J., Pradat-Diehl, P., Duhamel, J.-R. & Sirigu, A. (2004) The involvement of the orbitofrontal cortex in the experience of regret. Science 304(5674):1167–70. Available at: https://doi.org/10.1126/science.1094550.Google Scholar
Craver, C. F., Kwan, D., Steindam, C. & Rosenbaum, R. S. (2014b) Individuals with episodic amnesia are not stuck in time. Neuropsychologia 57:191–95. Available at: http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0028393214000797.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
D'Argembeau, A., Comblain, C. & Van der Linden, M. (2003) Phenomenal characteristics of autobiographical memories for positive, negative, and neutral events. Applied Cognitive Psychology 17(3):281–94. Available at: https://doi.org/10.1002/acp.856.Google Scholar
Hassabis, D., Kumaran, D. & Maguire, E. A. (2007a) Using imagination to understand the neural basis of episodic memory. The Journal of Neuroscience 27(52):14365–74. Available at: https://doi.org/10.1523/JNEUROSCI.4549-07.2007.Google Scholar
Hassabis, D., Kumaran, D., Vann, S. D. & Maguire, E. A. (2007b) Patients with hippocampal amnesia cannot imagine new experiences. Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences USA 104(5):1726–31. Available at: https://doi.org/10.1073/pnas.0610561104.Google Scholar
Klein, S. B., Loftus, J. & Kihlstrom, J. F. (2002b) Memory and temporal experience: The effects of episodic memory loss on an amnesic patient's ability to remember the past and imagine the future. Social Cognition 20(5):353–79. Available at: https://doi.org/10.1521/soco.20.5.353.21125.Google Scholar
Kwan, D., Craver, C. F., Green, L., Myerson, J., Boyer, P. & Rosenbaum, R. S. (2012) Future decision-making without episodic mental time travel. Hippocampus 22(6):1215–19. Available at: https://doi.org/10.1002/hipo.20981.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Kwan, D., Craver, C. F., Green, L., Myerson, J., Gao, F., Black, S. E. & Rosenbaum, R. S. (2015) Cueing the personal future to reduce discounting in intertemporal choice: Is episodic prospection necessary? Hippocampus 25(4):432–43. Available at: https://doi.org/10.1002/hipo.22431.Google Scholar
Kwan, D., Craver, C. F., Green, L., Myerson, J. & Rosenbaum, R. S. (2013) Dissociations in future thinking following hippocampal damage: Evidence from discounting and time perspective in episodic amnesia. Journal of Experimental Psychology. General 142(4):1355–69. Available at: https://doi.org/10.1037/a0034001.Google Scholar
Lebreton, M., Bertoux, M., Boutet, C., Lehericy, S., Dubois, B., Fossati, P. & Pessiglione, M. (2013) A critical role for the hippocampus in the valuation of imagined outcomes. PLoS Biology 11(10):e1001684. Available at: https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pbio.1001684.Google Scholar
Liu, L., Feng, T., Chen, J. & Li, H. (2013) The value of emotion: How does episodic prospection modulate delay discounting? PLoS ONE 8(11):e81717. Available at: https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0081717.Google Scholar
O'Donnell, S., Oluyomi Daniel, T. & Epstein, L. H. (2017) Does goal relevant episodic future thinking amplify the effect on delay discounting? Consciousness and Cognition 51:10–16. Available at: https://doi.org/10.1016/j.concog.2017.02.014.Google Scholar
Palombo, D. J., Keane, M. M. & Verfaellie, M. (2015) The medial temporal lobes are critical for reward-based decision making under conditions that promote episodic future thinking. Hippocampus 25(3):345–53. Available at: https://doi.org/10.1002/hipo.22376.Google Scholar
Peters, J. & Büchel, C. (2010) Episodic future thinking reduces reward delay discounting through an enhancement of prefrontal-mediotemporal interactions. Neuron 66(1):138–48. Available at: https://doi.org/10.1016/j.neuron.2010.03.026.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Race, E., Keane, M. M. & Verfaellie, M. (2011) Medial temporal lobe damage causes deficits in episodic memory and episodic future thinking not attributable to deficits in narrative construction. The Journal of Neuroscience 31(28):10262–69. Available at: https://doi.org/10.1523/JNEUROSCI.1145-11.2011.Google Scholar
Rick, S. & Loewenstein, G. (2008) Intangibility in intertemporal choice. Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society B: Biological Sciences 363(1511):3813–24. Available at: https://doi.org/10.1098/rstb.2008.0150.Google Scholar
Schacter, D. L., Addis, D. R. & Buckner, R. L. (2007) Remembering the past to imagine the future: The prospective brain. Nature Reviews Neuroscience 8(9):657–61. Available at: https://doi.org/10.1038/nrn2213.Google Scholar
Schacter, D. L., Benoit, R. G., De Brigard, F. & Szpunar, K. K. (2015) Episodic future thinking and episodic counterfactual thinking: Intersections between memory and decisions. Neurobiology of Learning and Memory 117:14–21. Available at: https://doi.org/10.1016/j.nlm.2013.12.008.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Schacter, D. L., Benoit, R. G. & Szpunar, K. K. (2017) Episodic future thinking: Mechanisms and functions. Current Opinion in Behavioral Sciences 17:41–50. Available at: https://doi.org/10.1016/j.cobeha.2017.06.002.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Squire, L. R., van der Horst, A. S., McDuff, S. G. R., Frascino, J. C., Hopkins, R. O. & Mauldin, K. N. (2010) Role of the hippocampus in remembering the past and imagining the future. Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences USA 107(44):19044–48. Available at: https://doi.org/10.1073/pnas.1014391107.Google Scholar
Stanley, M. L., Parikh, N., Stewart, G. W. & De Brigard, F. (2017) Emotional intensity in episodic autobiographical memory and counterfactual thinking. Consciousness and Cognition 48:283–91. Available at: https://doi.org/10.1016/j.concog.2016.12.013.Google Scholar
Szpunar, K. K., Watson, J. M. & McDermott, K. B. (2007) Neural substrates of envisioning the future. Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America 104(2):642–47. Available at: https://doi.org/10.1073/pnas.0610082104.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed