Pattern Separation and Pattern Completion Within the Hippocampal Circuit During Naturalistic Stimuli

Pattern separation and pattern completion in the hippocampus play a critical role in episodic learning and memory. However, there is limited empirical evidence supporting the role of the hippocampal circuit in these processes during complex continuous experiences. In this study, we analyzed high-resolution fMRI data from the “Forrest Gump” open-access dataset (16 participants) using a sliding-window temporal autocorrelation approach to investigate whether the canonical hippocampal circuit (DG-CA3-CA1-SUB) shows evidence consistent with the occurrence of pattern separation or pattern completion during a naturalistic audio movie task. Our results revealed that when processing continuous naturalistic stimuli, the DG-CA3 pair exhibited evidence consistent with the occurrence of the pattern separation process, whereas both the CA3-CA1 and CA1-SUB pairs showed evidence consistent with pattern completion. Moreover, during the latter half of the audio movie, we observed evidence consistent with a reduction in pattern completion in the CA3-CA1 pair and an increase in pattern completion in the CA1-SUB pair. Overall, these findings improve our understanding of the evidence related to the occurrence of pattern separation and pattern completion processes during natural experiences.