scholarly journals Filtering ability in visual working memory cannot be improved by temporal and spatial task cues

2015 ◽  
Vol 15 (12) ◽  
pp. 75
Author(s):  
Ayala Allon ◽  
Roy Luria
Keyword(s):  
Working Memory ◽  
Visual Working Memory ◽  
Spatial Task ◽  
Temporal And Spatial

Visuospatial Processing in Memory for Word Location in Writing

2012 ◽  
Vol 59 (3) ◽  
pp. 138-146 ◽  
Author(s):  
Nathalie Le Bigot ◽  
Jean-Michel Passerault ◽  
Thierry Olive
Keyword(s):  
Working Memory ◽  
Visual Working Memory ◽  
Spatial Task ◽  
Visual Task ◽  
Visual Noise ◽  
Written Text ◽  
Visuospatial Processing ◽  
Standard Composition ◽  
Word Location ◽  
Physical Layout

Two experiments examined how visuospatial processing engaged during text composition intervenes in memory for word location. Experiment 1 showed that in contrast to participants who performed a spatial task concurrently with composing a text, participants who performed a concurrent visual task recalled fewer word locations after the composition. Consequently, it is hypothesized that writers process the written text in order to visually represent its physical layout, and that this representation is then used when locating words. Experiment 2 tested this hypothesis by comparing a standard composition condition (with the written trace) with a condition in which the written trace was suppressed during composition, and with a condition without written trace and with added visual noise. Memory for word location only decreased with visual noise, indicating that construction of the visual representation of the text does not rely on the written trace but involves visual working memory.

Oculomotor selection underlies feature retention in visual working memory

2016 ◽  
Vol 115 (2) ◽  
pp. 1071-1076 ◽  
Author(s):  
Nina M. Hanning ◽  
Donatas Jonikaitis ◽  
Heiner Deubel ◽  
Martin Szinte
Keyword(s):  
Working Memory ◽  
Visual Working Memory ◽  
Target Selection ◽  
Spatial Task ◽  
Saccade Target ◽  
Task Relevance ◽  
Feature Representations ◽  
Feature Based ◽  
Target Locations

Oculomotor selection, spatial task relevance, and visual working memory (WM) are described as three processes highly intertwined and sustained by similar cortical structures. However, because task-relevant locations always constitute potential saccade targets, no study so far has been able to distinguish between oculomotor selection and spatial task relevance. We designed an experiment that allowed us to dissociate in humans the contribution of task relevance, oculomotor selection, and oculomotor execution to the retention of feature representations in WM. We report that task relevance and oculomotor selection lead to dissociable effects on feature WM maintenance. In a first task, in which an object's location was encoded as a saccade target, its feature representations were successfully maintained in WM, whereas they declined at nonsaccade target locations. Likewise, we observed a similar WM benefit at the target of saccades that were prepared but never executed. In a second task, when an object's location was marked as task relevant but constituted a nonsaccade target (a location to avoid), feature representations maintained at that location did not benefit. Combined, our results demonstrate that oculomotor selection is consistently associated with WM, whereas task relevance is not. This provides evidence for an overlapping circuitry serving saccade target selection and feature-based WM that can be dissociated from processes encoding task-relevant locations.

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