Emotional autobiographical memory retrieval in time domain

ABSTRACT

Autobiographical memory (AM) is an important psychological phenomenon that has significance for self-development and mental health. The psychological mechanisms of emotional AM retrieval and their association with individual emotional symptoms remain largely unclear in the literature. For this purpose, the current study provided cue words to elicit emotional AMs. Event-related potentials (ERPs) associated with the retrieval process of AMs were recorded and analyzed. We found that the ERP component N400 was sensitive to both emotional valence and retrieval state, such that its amplitude was larger for negative compared to positive AMs, and larger responses for unrecalled compared to recalled AMs. Further, the N400 amplitude in the positive recalled condition was correlated with individual difference in depression (measured by the Beck Depression Inventory). Another ERP component, the late positive potential (LPP), was also sensitive to emotional valence, such that its amplitude was larger (i.e., more positive-going) for positive compared to negative cues. No significant effect was observed on the early ERP components P1, N1, or P2. The current findings bring new understanding on the difference between positive and negative AMs retrieval in the time domain. Also, the importance of this difference to the individual level of depression is worth noting.

KEYWORDS:

• Autobiographical memory
• emotion
• event-related potential
• N400
• late positive potential

Acknowledgements

The authors would like to thank Yue He and Guo Wang for help with preparing supplementary materials.

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).

Declaration of ethics

All procedures performed in this study were in accordance with the 1964 Helsinki declaration and its later amendments or comparable ethical standards.

Data and code availability

The data and code of this study would be available upon request and with approvals of Institute of Basic Research in Clinical Medicine, China Academy of Chinese Medical Sciences. More information on making this request can be obtained from the first author, Dr. Rui Xu ([email protected]).

Additional information

Funding

This work was supported by the Beijing National Science Foundation: [Grant Number 7154227]; the National Natural Science Foundation of China: [Grant Number 32071083, 81503480, 31920103009]; the Fundamental Research Funds for the Central public welfare research institutes: [Grant Number Z0738, ZZ15-YQ-078, Z0652]; the Major Project of National Social Science Foundation (20&ZD153); Shenzhen-Hong Kong Institute of Brain Science – Shenzhen Fundamental Research Institutions (2022SHIBS0003).