Structured experience shapes strategy learning and neural dynamics in the medial entorhinal cortex.

ABSTRACT: Animals can solve new, complex tasks by reusing and adapting what they've learned before. This kind of flexibility depends not just on having prior experience, but on how that experience was structured in the first place. The design of early training curriculum is especially important: poorly structured experiences can hinder abstraction and limit generalization, while carefully structured training promotes more flexible and adaptive behavior. Yet, the neural mechanisms supporting this process remain unclear. To investigate how early training shapes learning we first trained recurrent neural networks (RNNs) on variants of an odor-timing task previously used to study complex timing behavior in mice. We then tested the RNN predictions on how previous experience affects generalization using b

SUBMITTER: Bowler JC 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC12154143 | biostudies-literature | 2025 May

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature