{
  "id": 9401779,
  "title": "The neural dynamics of familiarity representation during cued recall",
  "url": "https://urgent.news/2026/09/23/the-neural-dynamics-of-familiarity-representation-during-cued-recall",
  "topic": "ai",
  "section": "AI",
  "published": "2026-09-23T00:00:00.000Z",
  "source": {
    "name": "bioRxiv",
    "slug": "biorxiv",
    "url": "https://www.biorxiv.org/content/10.64898/2026.09.21.753245v1?rss=1"
  },
  "original_language": "en",
  "account": "Neural signatures of familiarity are evident when individuals perceive familiar faces, yet the mechanism behind this representation during memory recall via visual imagery remains unclear. Researchers combined perceptual and imagery conditions with electroencephalography and multivariate pattern analysis to investigate the relationship between perceptual and recall/imagery familiarity signals.\n\nIn a perceptual session, participants viewed images of four renowned individuals. In contrast, the imagery session utilized a cued recall paradigm, where abstract symbols were presented, each associated with the respective individual. By employing time-resolved multivariate decoding, the study aimed to determine if familiarity information was shared across stimulus categories, and if perceptual face familiarity representations overlapped with cued recall processing related to imagery.\n\nDuring face perception, familiarity information was robustly detected over occipito-temporal electrodes. Similarly, symbolic cues carried comparable familiarity information, indicating cross-category familiarity processing between symbols and faces. In the cued recall phase, familiarity information manifested over posterior regions, gradually evolving into a prolonged and late component over right anterior electrodes.\n\nRemarkably, cross-domain temporal generalization analysis unveiled an overlap between perceptual face familiarity patterns and recall/imagery-related processing. Perceptual face familiarity information mapped onto later processing during cued recall, displaying a pronounced and prolonged right anterior dominance. The onset of this right anterior signal occurred earlier in comparison to left posterior channels. In summary, these findings suggest that familiarity processing, akin to category representations, involves overlapping neural patterns across perception and recall/imagery. Initially, dynamic posterior representations align with perceptual analysis, transitioning into a stable and prolonged representation over right anterior sites, which is compatible with sustained processing related to recall and/or imagery.",
  "summary": "Face familiarity elicits reliable neural signatures during perception, yet how it is represented when faces are recalled from memory by using visual imagery and how these signals relate to perceptual representations, remains unclear. We combined perceptual and imagery conditions with electroencephalography and multivariate pattern analysis. In a perceptual session we presented of four famous…",
  "key_points": [],
  "editors_take": null,
  "illustration": null,
  "coverage": {
    "outlets": 1,
    "also_reported_by": []
  },
  "ai_generated": true,
  "disclaimer": "Summaries, key points and the editor’s take are written by software from other outlets’ reporting and may contain errors — always check the linked original."
}