Spatiotemporal configuration of memory arrays as a component of VWM representations

Abstract

Visual working memory (VWM) has been found to support a very limited representation of visual information and yet relatively little is known about the mechanisms that underlie this important cognitive construct. Prior investigations have revealed that VWM performance can be affected by relatively minor changes in the test method as well as the method of encoding. In the present two experiments, we separately investigated these two factors. The results suggest that sequential object displays can improve VWM performance significantly but that a lack of context relatedness between encoding and retrieval impairs performance. This impairment seems to be caused by a mismatch in the spatiotemporal configuration of the memory and test displays, and, importantly, cannot be compensated by selective attention. These findings suggest that spatiotemporal configuration information may be a fundamental component of the information that is stored in VWM as suggested by a number of influential theories.

Keywords:

• Visual working memory
• Change detection
• Attention and memory
• Working memory
• Episodic encoding
• Episodic context

Notes

¹ It is important to note that we use the terms VWM capacity and VWM performance interchangeably. The former is likely a function of the cognitive structure of the brain, whereas the latter is clearly influenced by external factors such as those presently under investigation.