Episodic events are flexibly encoded in both integrated and separated neural representations
Liu, Zhenghao LU ; Johansson, Mikael LU
and Bramao, Ines
LU
(2026)
In Nat. Commun.
17.
- Abstract
- Remembering everyday events involves noticing what different experiences share and preserving the details that set them apart, yet the neural processes supporting this balance remain unclear. Here, we record EEG while participants view naturalistic movie scenes that introduce episodic events with overlapping elements. Using time-resolved representational similarity analysis, we find that these events evoke both similarities and dissimilarities in neural patterns as new information unfolds. Similarities predict successful inference of information across separate episodes, consistent with integrative encoding. Dissimilarities, by contrast, predict accurate memory for individual events, indicating the formation of distinct event-specific... (More)
- Remembering everyday events involves noticing what different experiences share and preserving the details that set them apart, yet the neural processes supporting this balance remain unclear. Here, we record EEG while participants view naturalistic movie scenes that introduce episodic events with overlapping elements. Using time-resolved representational similarity analysis, we find that these events evoke both similarities and dissimilarities in neural patterns as new information unfolds. Similarities predict successful inference of information across separate episodes, consistent with integrative encoding. Dissimilarities, by contrast, predict accurate memory for individual events, indicating the formation of distinct event-specific traces. Together, these findings indicate that the brain encodes both integrated and separated neural representations to flexibly support different mnemonic goals and to balance relational inference with detailed recollection. (Less)
Please use this url to cite or link to this publication:
https://lup.lub.lu.se/record/a262d6f4-0e95-490f-bbd4-d0ce04242ed0
- author
- Liu, Zhenghao
LU
; Johansson, Mikael
LU
and Bramao, Ines
LU
- organization
- publishing date
- 2026-01-19
- type
- Contribution to journal
- publication status
- published
- subject
- in
- Nat. Commun.
- volume
- 17
- article number
- 752
- publisher
- Nature Publishing Group
- external identifiers
-
- pmid:41554723
- ISSN
- 2041-1723
- DOI
- 10.1038/s41467-026-68473-6
- language
- English
- LU publication?
- yes
- id
- a262d6f4-0e95-490f-bbd4-d0ce04242ed0
- date added to LUP
- 2026-01-23 11:00:52
- date last changed
- 2026-01-27 03:16:12
@article{a262d6f4-0e95-490f-bbd4-d0ce04242ed0,
abstract = {{Remembering everyday events involves noticing what different experiences share and preserving the details that set them apart, yet the neural processes supporting this balance remain unclear. Here, we record EEG while participants view naturalistic movie scenes that introduce episodic events with overlapping elements. Using time-resolved representational similarity analysis, we find that these events evoke both similarities and dissimilarities in neural patterns as new information unfolds. Similarities predict successful inference of information across separate episodes, consistent with integrative encoding. Dissimilarities, by contrast, predict accurate memory for individual events, indicating the formation of distinct event-specific traces. Together, these findings indicate that the brain encodes both integrated and separated neural representations to flexibly support different mnemonic goals and to balance relational inference with detailed recollection.}},
author = {{Liu, Zhenghao and Johansson, Mikael and Bramao, Ines}},
issn = {{2041-1723}},
language = {{eng}},
month = {{01}},
publisher = {{Nature Publishing Group}},
series = {{Nat. Commun.}},
title = {{Episodic events are flexibly encoded in both integrated and separated neural representations}},
url = {{http://dx.doi.org/10.1038/s41467-026-68473-6}},
doi = {{10.1038/s41467-026-68473-6}},
volume = {{17}},
year = {{2026}},
}