The hippocampus: A manifesto for change.

2013/07/15 by Eleanor A. Maguire, Sinéad L. Mullally · 406 citations
Neuroscience · Psychology · #Cognitive psychology #Cognitive science #Hippocampus #Manifesto #Memory and Neural Mechanisms #Neuroscience #Neuroscience and Neuropharmacology Research #Psychology #Stress Responses and Cortisol

paper · doi:10.1037/a0033650

published in Journal of Experimental Psychology General 142(4), 1180-1189 (American Psychological Association)

openalex publication_date 2013/07/15 · openalex created_date 2025/10/10 · openalex updated_date 2026/07/19

Abstract

We currently lack a unified and mechanistic account of how the hippocampus supports a range of disparate cognitive functions that includes episodic memory, imagining the future, and spatial navigation. Here, we argue that in order to leverage this long-standing issue, traditional notions regarding the architecture of memory should be eschewed. Instead, we invoke the idea that scenes are central to hippocampal information processing. This view is motivated by mounting evidence that the hippocampus is constantly constructing spatially coherent scenes, automatically anticipating and synthesizing representations of the world beyond the immediate sensorium. By characterizing the precise relationship between scenes and the hippocampus, we believe a theoretically enriched understanding of its fundamental role and its breakdown in pathology can emerge.

Citations

• The hippocampus as a spatial map. Preliminary evidence from unit activity in the freely-moving rat

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• Anticipatory scene representation in preschool children's recall and recognition memory
• Testing the “Boundaries” of boundary extension: Anticipatory scene representation across development and disorder
• Visual, haptic and bimodal scene perception: Evidence for a unitary representation

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