What induces memory destabilization, causing the reconsolidation window to open?
Regarding how memory destabilization occurs, there is a critically important nuance: Some neuroscientists (and all science journalists) have written that what triggers destabilization of the memory, opening the reconsolidation window, is simply the reactivation of the memory. However, at least four different research teams have shown that what triggers destabilization of the memory is not memory reactivation alone, but reactivation of the memory plus a concurrent experience that significantly mismatches what the memory expects. Those groups have demonstrated that reactivation alone does not destabilize the memory, and not all neuroscientists seem to be aware of this finding yet. For example, if you turn ON a blue light that in prior training was always paired with getting a shock, destabilization is not launched by the memory reactivation that occurs in response to the blue light. It is when the blue light goes OFF without a shock happening, disconfirming the memory, that destabilizati
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