Memory-based attentional capture by colour and shape contents in visual working memory

This study aimed to determine the unit of interaction between visual working memory (VWM) and attention. Therefore, we examined two opposing hypotheses: (a) the unit of interaction is a Boolean map, which is a data format that can contain only one within-dimension feature (e.g., “red” or “circle”; Boolean-map-unit hypothesis); and (b) the unit of interaction is an object (object-unit hypothesis). In two experiments, participants held in their VWM two colors from either one or two objects, or one color, and then performed a search task that sometimes contained a distractor with a memory-matching color. The results showed that the attentional capture by two different colors encoded from one integrated object was equivalent to that of a single color, and was much stronger than that of two colors from separate objects, which supports the object-unit hypothesis. These findings have crucial implications for understanding the architecture of interaction between VWM and attention.

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Attentional control settings and visual working memory (preprint)

10.31219/osf.io/rde2m ◽

2021 ◽

Author(s):

Lindsay Plater ◽

Blaire Dube ◽

Maria Giammarco ◽

Kirsten Donaldson ◽

Krista Miller ◽

...

Keyword(s):

Working Memory ◽

Visual Working Memory ◽

Attentional Capture ◽

Attentional Control ◽

Active Representation ◽

Attentional Control Settings ◽

Visual Spatial ◽

Cueing Task ◽

Visual Properties ◽

With Memory

In the present study, we examined whether visual working memory (VWM) can support attentional control settings (ACSs) by maintaining representations of the visual properties that should capture attention. Beyond enhancing capture by memory-matching stimuli, can VWM representations suppress capture by non-matching stimuli? In Experiments 1a/b, participants maintained a colour in VWM that changed every trial while completing a Posner cueing task with memory matching and memory non-matching colour cues. We replicated the conventional finding that the colour in VWM modulated distractor costs, indicating that the colour was represented in the active state. Yet, this colour had no effect on the capture of visual spatial attention measured via cueing effects, suggesting that merely remembering a colour in VWM did not define participants’ ACSs. When participants searched for the colour in VWM, it did support an ACS that eliminated cueing effects by non-matching colours (Experiment 2), though not if participants searched for two colours stored in VWM (Experiment 3). These findings demonstrate that one active representation in VWM can support ACSs, though active representation alone is insufficient. These findings also speak to the ongoing debate about the automaticity of attentional capture by contributing additional evidence that distractor costs and cueing effects are dissociable measures of attentional capture.

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Oculomotor capture reveals trial-by-trial neural correlates of attentional guidance by contents of visual working memory

10.1101/320259 ◽

2018 ◽

Author(s):

Valerie M. Beck ◽

Timothy J. Vickery

Keyword(s):

Working Memory ◽

Retention Interval ◽

Visual Working Memory ◽

Attentional Capture ◽

Anterior Cingulate ◽

Saccade Target ◽

Neural Basis ◽

Oculomotor Capture ◽

Attentional Guidance ◽

Task Irrelevant

AbstractEvidence from attentional and oculomotor capture, contingent capture, and other paradigms suggests that mechanisms supporting human visual working memory (VWM) and visual attention are intertwined. Features held in VWM bias guidance toward matching items even when those features are task irrelevant. However, the neural basis of this interaction is underspecified. Prior examinations using fMRI have primarily relied on coarse comparisons across experimental conditions that produce varying amounts of capture. To examine the neural dynamics of attentional capture on a trial-by-trial basis, we applied an oculomotor paradigm that produced discrete measures of capture. On each trial, subjects were shown a memory item, followed by a blank retention interval, then a saccade target that appeared to the left or right. On some trials, an irrelevant distractor appeared above or below fixation. Once the saccade target was fixated, subjects completed a forced-choice memory test. Critically, either the target or distractor could match the feature held in VWM. Although task irrelevant, this manipulation produced differences in behavior: participants were more likely to saccade first to an irrelevant VWM-matching distractor compared with a non-matching distractor – providing a discrete measure of capture. We replicated this finding while recording eye movements and scanning participants’ brains using fMRI. To examine the neural basis of oculomotor capture, we separately modeled the retention interval for capture and non-capture trials within the distractor-match condition. We found that frontal activity, including anterior cingulate cortex and superior frontal gyrus regions, differentially predicted subsequent oculomotor capture by a memory-matching distractor. Other regions previously implicated as involved in attentional capture by VWM-matching items showed no differential activity across capture and no-capture trials, even at a liberal threshold. Our findings demonstrate the power of trial-by-trial analyses of oculomotor capture as a means to examine the underlying relationship between VWM and attentional guidance systems.

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