The past, the present, and the future of future-oriented mental time travel: Editors' introduction

This introductory chapter reviews research on future-oriented mental time travel to date (the past), provides an overview of the contents of the book (the present), and enumerates some possible research directions suggested by the latter (the future)

Episodic future thinking in generalized anxiety disorder

Research on future-oriented cognition in generalized anxiety disorder (GAD) has primarily focused on worry, while less is known about the role of episodic future thinking (EFT), an imagery-based cognitive process. To characterize EFT in this disorder, we used the experimental recombination procedure, in which 21 GAD and 19 healthy participants simulated positive, neutral and negative novel future events either once or repeatedly, and rated their phenomenological experience of EFT. Results showed that healthy controls spontaneously generated more detailed EFT over repeated simulations. Both groups found EFT easier to generate after repeated simulations, except when GAD participants simulated positive events. They also perceived higher plausibility of negative-not positive or neutral-future events than did controls. These results demonstrate a negativity bias in GAD individuals' episodic future cognition, and suggest their relative deficit in generating vivid EFT. We discuss implications for the theory and treatment of GAD.R01 MH060941 - NIMH NIH HHS; R01 MH078308 - NIMH NIH HHS; R01AG08441 - NIA NIH HHS; R01 AT007257 - NCCIH NIH HHS; R01MH60941 - NIMH NIH HHS; R01 AG008441 - NIA NIH HHS; R34 MH099311 - NIMH NIH HHS; R21MH102646 - NIMH NIH HHS; R01AT007257 - NCCIH NIH HHS; R21 MH102646 - NIMH NIH HHS; R34MH078308 - NIMH NIH HH

Remembering and imagining alternative versions of the personal past

Although autobiographical memory and episodic simulations recruit similar core brain regions, episodic simulations engage additional neural recruitment in the frontoparietal control network due to greater demands on constructive processes. However, previous functional neuroimaging studies showing differences in remembering and episodic simulation have focused on veridical retrieval of past experiences, and thus have not fully considered how retrieving the past in different ways from how it was originally experienced may also place similar demands on constructive processes. Here we examined how alternative versions of the past are constructed when adopting different egocentric perspectives during autobiographical memory retrieval compared to simulating hypothetical events from the personal past that could have occurred, or episodic counterfactual thinking. Participants were asked to generate titles for specific autobiographical memories from the last five years, and then, during functional magnetic resonance (fMRI) scanning, were asked to repeatedly retrieve autobiographical memories or imagine counterfactual events cued by the titles. We used an fMRI adaptation paradigm in order to isolate neural regions that were sensitive to adopting alternative egocentric perspectives and counterfactual simulations of the personal past. The fMRI results revealed that voxels within left posterior inferior parietal and ventrolateral frontal cortices were sensitive to novel visual perspectives and counterfactual simulations. Our findings suggest that the neural regions supporting remembering become more similar to those underlying episodic simulation when we adopt alternative egocentric perspectives of the veridical past

Shifting visual perspective during retrieval shapes autobiographical memories

The dynamic and flexible nature of memories is evident in our ability to adopt multiple visual perspectives. Although autobiographical memories are typically encoded from the visual perspective of our own eyes they can be retrieved from the perspective of an observer looking at our self. Here, we examined the neural mechanisms of shifting visual perspective during long-term memory retrieval and its influence on online and subsequent memories using functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI). Participants generated specific autobiographical memories from the last five years and rated their visual perspective. In a separate fMRI session, they were asked to retrieve the memories across three repetitions while maintaining the same visual perspective as their initial rating or by shifting to an alternative perspective. Visual perspective shifting during autobiographical memory retrieval was supported by a linear decrease in neural recruitment across repetitions in the posterior parietal cortices. Additional analyses revealed that the precuneus, in particular, contributed to both online and subsequent changes in the phenomenology of memories. Our findings show that flexibly shifting egocentric perspective during autobiographical memory retrieval is supported by the precuneus, and suggest that this manipulation of mental imagery during retrieval has consequences for how memories are retrieved and later remembered

Author's personal copy Episodic future thought and its relation to remembering: Evidence from ratings of subjective experience

Abstract The goal of the present study was to examine the hypothesis that the ability to construct vivid mental images of the future involves sampling the contents of memory. In two experiments, participants envisioned future scenarios occurring in contextual settings that were represented in memory in varying degrees of perceptual detail. In both experiments, detailed contextual settings were associated with more detailed images of the future and a stronger subjective experience. Our findings suggest that the contents of memory are routinely sampled during the construction of personal future scenarios

Mind Wandering and Education: From the Classroom to Online Learning

In recent years, cognitive and educational psychologists have become interested in applying principles of cognitive psychology to education. Here, we discuss the importance of understanding the nature and occurrence of mind wandering in the context of classroom and online lectures. In reviewing the relevant literature, we begin by considering early studies that provide important clues about student attentiveness via dependent measures such as physical markers of inattention, note taking, and retention. We then provide a broad overview of studies that have directly measured mind wandering in the classroom and online learning environments. Finally, we conclude by discussing interventions that might be effective at curbing the occurrence of mind wandering in educational settings, and consider various avenues of future research that we believe can shed light on this well-known but little studied phenomenon