Targeted stimulation of face-selective visual cortex at retrieval boosts associative face memory in healthy young adults.

Episodic memory retrieval relies on encoding-pattern reinstatement (EPR), the reactivation of neural representations formed during encoding. Although EPR has been associated with successful remembering, it remains unclear whether this process can be proactively enhanced at retrieval. Specifically, it is unknown whether targeted brain stimulation immediately before retrieval can strengthen cortical reinstatement and improve memory in a content-specific manner. To address this question, we combined noninvasive brain stimulation with electroencephalography (EEG) in a 2-d associative memory paradigm. On day 1, participants encoded word-face and word-scene pairs. On day 2, immediately prior to retrieval, they received either intermittent theta burst stimulation (iTBS) or sham stimulation targeted to the right occipital face area, a region specialized for face processing. Pre-retrieval iTBS selectively enhanced associative memory for faces, but not scenes. While the behavioral findings demonstrate a category-specific enhancement of memory following stimulation, the exploratory multivariate pattern analysis on EEG data remained inconclusive as to whether EPR represents the mechanism underlying the observed memory benefit. Together, these findings show that targeted stimulation of face-selective visual cortex can selectively enhance associative face memory at retrieval, supporting a core tenet of the EPR framework and offering a potential pathway for targeted brain stimulation to alleviate content-specific memory deficits.