Looking sharp: Becoming a search template boosts precision and stability in visual working memory

Visual working memory (VWM) plays a central role in visual cognition, and current work suggests that there is a special state in VWM for items that are the goal of visual searches. However, whether the quality of memory for target templates differs from memory for other items in VWM is currently unk...

Full description

Saved in:
Bibliographic Details
Published in:Attention, perception & psychophysics perception & psychophysics, 2017-08, Vol.79 (6), p.1643-1651
Main Authors: Rajsic, Jason, Ouslis, Natasha E., Wilson, Daryl E., Pratt, Jay
Format: Article
Language:English
Subjects:
Adult
Attention
Attention - physiology
Behavioral Science and Psychology
Cognition & reasoning
Cognitive Psychology
Cues
Evidence
Experimental psychology
Female
Humans
Male
Memorization
Memory
Memory, Short-Term - physiology
Mental Recall - physiology
Neurosciences
Predictive Validity
Prompting
Psychology
Quality
Reaction Time
Resistance (Psychology)
Short Term Memory
Stimuli
Trends
Visual Perception - physiology
Visual task performance
Young Adult
Citations: Items that this one cites
Items that cite this one
Online Access:Get full text
Tags: Add Tag
No Tags, Be the first to tag this record!
Description
Summary:Visual working memory (VWM) plays a central role in visual cognition, and current work suggests that there is a special state in VWM for items that are the goal of visual searches. However, whether the quality of memory for target templates differs from memory for other items in VWM is currently unknown. In this study, we measured the precision and stability of memory for search templates and accessory items to determine whether search templates receive representational priority in VWM. Memory for search templates exhibited increased precision and probability of recall, whereas accessory items were remembered less often. Additionally, while memory for Templates showed benefits when instances of the Template appeared in search, this benefit was not consistently observed for Accessory items when they appeared in search. Our results show that becoming a search template can substantially affect the quality of a representation in VWM.
ISSN:1943-3921
1943-393X
DOI:10.3758/s13414-017-1342-5