Visual working memory supports configuration, but not maintenance or application, of attentional control settings

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.

Download Full-text

Fear not! Anxiety biases attentional enhancement of threat without impairing working memory filtering

10.31234/osf.io/rn4fa ◽

2019 ◽

Cited By ~ 1

Author(s):

Christine Salahub ◽

Stephen Emrich

Keyword(s):

Working Memory ◽

Visual Working Memory ◽

State Anxiety ◽

Attentional Control ◽

Event Related Potentials ◽

Memory Storage ◽

Attentional Biases ◽

Related Potentials ◽

Filtering Efficiency ◽

Memory Resources

Individuals with anxiety have attentional biases toward threat-related distractors. This deficit in attentional control has been shown to impact visual working memory (VWM) filtering efficiency, as anxious individuals inappropriately store threatening distractors in VWM. It remains unclear, however, whether this mis-allocation of memory resources is due to inappropriate attentional enhancement of threatening distractors, or to a failure in suppression. Here, we used a systematically lateralized VWM task with fearful and neutral faces to examine event-related potentials related to attentional selection (N2pc), suppression (PD), and working memory maintenance (CDA). We found that state anxiety correlated with attentional enhancement of threat-related distractors, such that more anxious individuals had larger N2pc amplitudes toward fearful distractors than neutral distractors. However, there was no correlation between anxiety and memory storage of fearful distractors (CDA). These findings demonstrate that anxiety biases attention toward fearful distractors, but that this bias does not always guarantee increased memory storage of threat-related distractors.

Download Full-text

Inability to suppress salient distractors predicts low visual working memory capacity

Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences ◽

10.1073/pnas.1523471113 ◽

2016 ◽

Vol 113 (13) ◽

pp. 3693-3698 ◽

Cited By ~ 59

Author(s):

John M. Gaspar ◽

Gregory J. Christie ◽

David J. Prime ◽

Pierre Jolicœur ◽

John J. McDonald

Keyword(s):

Working Memory ◽

Visual Working Memory ◽

Visual Processing ◽

Attentional Control ◽

Search Task ◽

Visual Search Task ◽

Working Memory Capacity ◽

High Capacity ◽

Visual Objects ◽

Neurophysiological Activity

According to contemporary accounts of visual working memory (vWM), the ability to efficiently filter relevant from irrelevant information contributes to an individual’s overall vWM capacity. Although there is mounting evidence for this hypothesis, very little is known about the precise filtering mechanism responsible for controlling access to vWM and for differentiating low- and high-capacity individuals. Theoretically, the inefficient filtering observed in low-capacity individuals might be specifically linked to problems enhancing relevant items, suppressing irrelevant items, or both. To find out, we recorded neurophysiological activity associated with attentional selection and active suppression during a competitive visual search task. We show that high-capacity individuals actively suppress salient distractors, whereas low-capacity individuals are unable to suppress salient distractors in time to prevent those items from capturing attention. These results demonstrate that individual differences in vWM capacity are associated with the timing of a specific attentional control operation that suppresses processing of salient but irrelevant visual objects and restricts their access to higher stages of visual processing.

Download Full-text

Cross-frequency synchronization connects networks of fast and slow oscillations during visual working memory maintenance

eLife ◽

10.7554/elife.13451 ◽

2016 ◽

Vol 5 ◽

Cited By ~ 45

Author(s):

Felix Siebenhühner ◽

Sheng H Wang ◽

J Matias Palva ◽

Satu Palva

Keyword(s):

Working Memory ◽

Visual Working Memory ◽

Attentional Control ◽

Phase Synchronization ◽

Sensory Information ◽

Gamma Oscillations ◽

Frequency Synchronization ◽

Neuronal Processing ◽

Gamma Frequencies ◽

Frequency Phase

Neuronal activity in sensory and fronto-parietal (FP) areas underlies the representation and attentional control, respectively, of sensory information maintained in visual working memory (VWM). Within these regions, beta/gamma phase-synchronization supports the integration of sensory functions, while synchronization in theta/alpha bands supports the regulation of attentional functions. A key challenge is to understand which mechanisms integrate neuronal processing across these distinct frequencies and thereby the sensory and attentional functions. We investigated whether such integration could be achieved by cross-frequency phase synchrony (CFS). Using concurrent magneto- and electroencephalography, we found that CFS was load-dependently enhanced between theta and alpha–gamma and between alpha and beta-gamma oscillations during VWM maintenance among visual, FP, and dorsal attention (DA) systems. CFS also connected the hubs of within-frequency-synchronized networks and its strength predicted individual VWM capacity. We propose that CFS integrates processing among synchronized neuronal networks from theta to gamma frequencies to link sensory and attentional functions.

Download Full-text

Working Memory Capacity Is More Than Just Attentional Control: Evidence From Eye-Movements During a Visual Working Memory Task

PsycEXTRA Dataset ◽

10.1037/e633262013-214 ◽

2013 ◽

Author(s):

Jonathan T. Mall ◽

Candice C. Morey ◽

Michael J. Wolff ◽

Franziska Lehnert

Keyword(s):

Working Memory ◽

Eye Movements ◽

Visual Working Memory ◽

Attentional Control ◽

Working Memory Capacity ◽

Memory Task ◽

Memory Capacity

Download Full-text

Visual working memory gives up attentional control early in learning: Ruling out interhemispheric cancellation

Psychophysiology ◽

10.1111/psyp.12217 ◽

2014 ◽

Vol 51 (8) ◽

pp. 800-804 ◽

Cited By ~ 8

Author(s):

Robert M. G. Reinhart ◽

Nancy B. Carlisle ◽

Geoffrey F. Woodman

Keyword(s):

Working Memory ◽

Visual Working Memory ◽

Attentional Control

Download Full-text

Reduced Attentional Control in Older Adults Leads to Deficits in Flexible Prioritization of Visual Working Memory

Brain Sciences ◽

10.3390/brainsci10080542 ◽

2020 ◽

Vol 10 (8) ◽

pp. 542

Author(s):

Sarah E. Henderson ◽

Holly A. Lockhart ◽

Emily E. Davis ◽

Stephen M. Emrich ◽

Karen L. Campbell

Keyword(s):

Older Adults ◽

Working Memory ◽

Visual Working Memory ◽

Age Differences ◽

Attentional Control ◽

Age Groups ◽

Allocation Of Resources ◽

Component Mixture ◽

Delayed Recall ◽

Flexible Resource

Visual working memory (VWM) resources have been shown to be flexibly distributed according to item priority. This flexible allocation of resources may depend on attentional control, an executive function known to decline with age. In this study, we sought to determine how age differences in attentional control affect VWM performance when attention is flexibly allocated amongst targets of varying priority. Participants performed a delayed-recall task wherein item priority was varied. Error was modelled using a three-component mixture model to probe different aspects of performance (precision, guess-rate, and non-target errors). The flexible resource model offered a good fit to the data from both age groups, but older adults showed consistently lower precision and higher guess rates. Importantly, when demands on flexible resource allocation were highest, older adults showed more non-target errors, often swapping in the item that had a higher priority at encoding. Taken together, these results suggest that the ability to flexibly allocate attention in VWM is largely maintained with age, but older adults are less precise overall and sometimes swap in salient, but no longer relevant, items possibly due to their lessened ability to inhibit previously attended information.

Download Full-text