Memory consolidation as an adaptive process

We rely on our long-term memories to guide future behaviors, making it adaptive to prioritize the retention of goal-relevant, salient information in memory. In this review, we discuss findings from rodent and human research to demonstrate that active processes during post-encoding consolidation support the selective stabilization of recent experience into adaptive, long-term memories. Building upon literatures focused on dynamics at the cellular level, we highlight that consolidation also transforms memories at the systems level to support future goal-relevant behavior, resulting in more generalized memory traces in the brain and behavior. We synthesize previous literatures spanning animal research, human cognitive neuroscience, and cognitive psychology to propose an integrative framework for adaptive consolidation by which goal-relevant memoranda are tagged for subsequent consolidation, resulting in selective transformations to the structure of memories that support flexible, goal-relevant behaviors.

Automated summary

This review explores how active processes during post-encoding consolidation support the selective stabilization of recent experience into adaptive, long-term memories. It highlights that consolidation transforms memories at both cellular and systems levels to support future goal-relevant behavior, resulting in more generalized memory traces in the brain and behavior. The integrative framework proposed suggests that goal-relevant memoranda are tagged for subsequent consolidation, leading to selective transformations in memory structures that support flexible, goal-relevant behaviors.