Effect of test anxiety on visual working memory capacity using evidence from event‐related potentials

It was recently proposed that lexical prediction in sentence context encompasses two qualitatively distinct prediction mechanisms: “pre-activation,” namely, activating representations stored in long-term memory, and “pre-updating,” namely, updating the sentence's representation, built online in working memory (WM), to include the predicted content [Lau, E. F., Holcomb, P. J., & Kuperberg, G. R. Dissociating N400 effects of prediction from association in single-word contexts. Journal of Cognitive Neuroscience, 25, 484–502, 2013]. The current study sought to find evidence for pre-updating and test the influence of individual differences in WM capacity on the tendency to engage in this process. Participants read strongly and weakly constraining sentences. ERPs were measured on the predictable noun as well as on the preceding verb, where the prediction is generated. Increased P600 amplitude was observed at the verb in the strongly constraining sentences, reflecting integration of the predicted upcoming argument, thus providing evidence for pre-updating. This effect was greater for participants with higher WM capacity, indicating that the tendency to engage in pre-updating is highly affected by WM capacity. The opposite effect was observed at the noun, that is, for participants with higher WM span, a greater decrease in P600 amplitude in the strongly constraining sentences was observed, indicating that the integration of a pre-updated word was easier. We discuss these results in light of previous literature and propose a plausible architecture to account for the interplay between pre-activation and pre-updating, mediating the influence of factors such as WM capacity.

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Individual Differences in Working Memory Capacity Modulate Electrophysiological Correlates of Semantic Negative Priming From Single Words

Frontiers in Behavioral Neuroscience ◽

10.3389/fnbeh.2021.765290 ◽

2021 ◽

Vol 15 ◽

Author(s):

Montserrat Megías ◽

Juan J. Ortells ◽

Isabel Carmona ◽

Carmen Noguera ◽

Markus Kiefer

Keyword(s):

Working Memory ◽

Individual Differences ◽

Negative Priming ◽

Working Memory Capacity ◽

Event Related Potentials ◽

Memory Capacity ◽

Behavioral Measures ◽

Related Potentials ◽

First Time ◽

Categorization Judgment

In the present study, event-related potentials (ERPs) were registered during a semantic negative priming (NP) task in participants with higher and lower working memory capacity (WMC). On each trial participants had to actively ignore a briefly presented single prime word, which was followed either immediately or after a delay by a mask. Thereafter, either a semantically related or an unrelated target word was presented, to which participants made a semantic categorization judgment. The ignored prime produced a behavioral semantic NP in delayed (but not in immediate) masking trials, and only for participants with a higher-WMC. Both masking type and WMC also modulated ERP priming effects. When the ignored prime was immediately followed by a mask (which impeded its conscious identification) a reliable N400 modulation was found irrespective of participants’ WMC. However, when the mask onset following the prime was delayed (thus allowing its conscious identification), an attenuation of a late positive ERP (LPC) was observed in related compared to unrelated trials, but only in the higher-WMC group showing reliable behavioral NP. The present findings demonstrate for the first time that individual differences in WMC modulate both behavioral measures and electrophysiological correlates of semantic NP.

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Test anxiety impairs filtering ability in visual working memory: Evidence from event-related potentials

Journal of Affective Disorders ◽

10.1016/j.jad.2021.05.091 ◽

2021 ◽

Vol 292 ◽

pp. 700-707

Author(s):

Jintao Song ◽

Lei Chang ◽

Renlai Zhou

Keyword(s):

Working Memory ◽

Test Anxiety ◽

Visual Working Memory ◽

Event Related Potentials ◽

Related Potentials

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Transdiagnostic comparison of visual working memory capacity in bipolar disorder and schizophrenia

International Journal of Bipolar Disorders ◽

10.1186/s40345-020-00217-x ◽

2021 ◽

Vol 9 (1) ◽

Author(s):

Catherine V. Barnes-Scheufler ◽

Caroline Passow ◽

Lara Rösler ◽

Jutta S. Mayer ◽

Viola Oertel ◽

...

Keyword(s):

Bipolar Disorder ◽

Working Memory ◽

Visual Working Memory ◽

Effect Size ◽

Working Memory Capacity ◽

Memory Capacity ◽

Medium Effect ◽

Full Spectrum ◽

Small Effect Size ◽

The Difference

Abstract Background Impaired working memory is a core cognitive deficit in both bipolar disorder and schizophrenia. Its study might yield crucial insights into the underpinnings of both disorders on the cognitive and neurophysiological level. Visual working memory capacity is a particularly promising construct for such translational studies. However, it has not yet been investigated across the full spectrum of both disorders. The aim of our study was to compare the degree of reductions of visual working memory capacity in patients with bipolar disorder (PBD) and patients with schizophrenia (PSZ) using a paradigm well established in cognitive neuroscience. Methods 62 PBD, 64 PSZ, and 70 healthy controls (HC) completed a canonical visual change detection task. Participants had to encode the color of four circles and indicate after a short delay whether the color of one of the circles had changed or not. We estimated working memory capacity using Pashler’s K. Results Working memory capacity was significantly reduced in both PBD and PSZ compared to HC. We observed a small effect size (r = .202) for the difference between HC and PBD and a medium effect size (r = .370) for the difference between HC and PSZ. Working memory capacity in PSZ was also significantly reduced compared to PBD with a small effect size (r = .201). Thus, PBD showed an intermediate level of impairment. Conclusions These findings provide evidence for a gradient of reduced working memory capacity in bipolar disorder and schizophrenia, with PSZ showing the strongest degree of impairment. This underscores the importance of disturbed information processing for both bipolar disorder and schizophrenia. Our results are compatible with the cognitive manifestation of a neurodevelopmental gradient affecting bipolar disorder to a lesser degree than schizophrenia. They also highlight the relevance of visual working memory capacity for the development of both behavior- and brain-based transdiagnostic biomarkers.

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Visual working memory capacity: from psychophysics and neurobiology to individual differences

Trends in Cognitive Sciences ◽

10.1016/j.tics.2013.06.006 ◽

2013 ◽

Vol 17 (8) ◽

pp. 391-400 ◽

Cited By ~ 424

Author(s):

Steven J. Luck ◽

Edward K. Vogel

Keyword(s):

Working Memory ◽

Individual Differences ◽

Visual Working Memory ◽

Working Memory Capacity ◽

Memory Capacity

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Re-evaluating the relationships among filtering activity, unnecessary storage, and visual working memory capacity

Cognitive Affective & Behavioral Neuroscience ◽

10.3758/s13415-015-0341-z ◽

2015 ◽

Vol 15 (3) ◽

pp. 589-597 ◽

Cited By ~ 6

Author(s):

Stephen M. Emrich ◽

Michael A. Busseri

Keyword(s):

Working Memory ◽

Visual Working Memory ◽

Working Memory Capacity ◽

Memory Capacity

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Greater Visual Working Memory Capacity for Visually Matched Stimuli When They Are Perceived as Meaningful

Journal of Cognitive Neuroscience ◽

10.1162/jocn_a_01693 ◽

2021 ◽

Vol 33 (5) ◽

pp. 902-918 ◽

Cited By ~ 1

Author(s):

Isabel E. Asp ◽

Viola S. Störmer ◽

Timothy F. Brady

Keyword(s):

Working Memory ◽

Visual Working Memory ◽

Visual Information ◽

Memory Performance ◽

Working Memory Capacity ◽

Visual Complexity ◽

Memory Capacity ◽

Subjective Perception ◽

Neural Delay ◽

Meaningful Stimuli

Abstract Almost all models of visual working memory—the cognitive system that holds visual information in an active state—assume it has a fixed capacity: Some models propose a limit of three to four objects, where others propose there is a fixed pool of resources for each basic visual feature. Recent findings, however, suggest that memory performance is improved for real-world objects. What supports these increases in capacity? Here, we test whether the meaningfulness of a stimulus alone influences working memory capacity while controlling for visual complexity and directly assessing the active component of working memory using EEG. Participants remembered ambiguous stimuli that could either be perceived as a face or as meaningless shapes. Participants had higher performance and increased neural delay activity when the memory display consisted of more meaningful stimuli. Critically, by asking participants whether they perceived the stimuli as a face or not, we also show that these increases in visual working memory capacity and recruitment of additional neural resources are because of the subjective perception of the stimulus and thus cannot be driven by physical properties of the stimulus. Broadly, this suggests that the capacity for active storage in visual working memory is not fixed but that more meaningful stimuli recruit additional working memory resources, allowing them to be better remembered.

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