scholarly journals Remembered but Unused: The Accessory Items in Working Memory that Do Not Guide Attention

2009 ◽  
Vol 21 (6) ◽  
pp. 1081-1091 ◽  
Author(s):  
Judith C. Peters ◽  
Rainer Goebel ◽  
Pieter R. Roelfsema
Keyword(s):  
Working Memory ◽  
Event Related Potentials ◽  
Target Object ◽  
Memory Item ◽  
Matching Process ◽  
Selection Negativity ◽  
Comparable Performance ◽  
Related Potentials ◽  
Memory Representations ◽  
Subsequent Task

If we search for an item, a representation of this item in our working memory guides attention to matching items in the visual scene. We can hold multiple items in working memory. Do all these items guide attention in parallel? We asked participants to detect a target object in a stream of objects while they maintained a second item in memory for a subsequent task. On some trials, we presented this memory item as a distractor in the stream. Subjects did not confuse these memory items with the search target, as the false alarm rate on trials where the memory item was presented in the stream was comparable to that on trials with only regular distractors. However, a comparable performance does not exclude that the memory items are processed differently from normal distractors. We therefore recorded event-related potentials (ERPs) evoked by search targets, memory items, and regular distractors. As expected, ERPs evoked by search targets differed from those evoked by distractors. Search targets elicited an occipital selection negativity and a frontal selection positivity indexing selective attention, whereas the P3b component, which reflects the matching of sensory events to memory representations, was enhanced for targets compared to distractors. Remarkably, the ERPs evoked by memory items were indistinguishable from the ERPs evoked by normal distractors. This implies that the search target has a special status in working memory that is not shared by the other items. These other, “accessory” items do not guide attention and are excluded from the matching process.

scholarly journals When Memory Is Not Enough: Electrophysiological Evidence for Goal-dependent Use of Working Memory Representations in Guiding Visual Attention

2011 ◽  
Vol 23 (10) ◽  
pp. 2650-2664 ◽  
Author(s):  
Nancy B. Carlisle ◽  
Geoffrey F. Woodman
Keyword(s):  
Working Memory ◽  
Visual Attention ◽  
Executive Control ◽  
Event Related Potentials ◽  
Covert Attention ◽  
Behavioral Measures ◽  
Competition Theory ◽  
Attentional Deployment ◽  
Related Potentials ◽  
Memory Representations

Biased competition theory proposes that representations in working memory drive visual attention to select similar inputs. However, behavioral tests of this hypothesis have led to mixed results. These inconsistent findings could be due to the inability of behavioral measures to reliably detect the early, automatic effects on attentional deployment that the memory representations exert. Alternatively, executive mechanisms may govern how working memory representations influence attention based on higher-level goals. In the present study, we tested these hypotheses using the N2pc component of participants' event-related potentials to directly measure the early deployments of covert attention. Participants searched for a target in an array that sometimes contained a memory-matching distractor. In Experiments 1 to 3, we manipulated the difficulty of the target discrimination and the proximity of distractors, but consistently observed that covert attention was deployed to the search targets and not the memory-matching distractors. In Experiment 4, we showed that when participants' goal involved attending to memory-matching items, these items elicited a large and early N2pc. Our findings demonstrate that working memory representations alone are not sufficient to guide early deployments of visual attention to matching inputs and that goal-dependent executive control mediates the interactions between working memory representations and visual attention.

scholarly journals Distinct neural mechanisms for spatially lateralized and spatially global visual working memory representations

2016 ◽  
Vol 116 (4) ◽  
pp. 1715-1727 ◽  
Author(s):  
Keisuke Fukuda ◽  
Min-Suk Kang ◽  
Geoffrey F. Woodman
Keyword(s):  
Working Memory ◽  
Visual Cortex ◽  
Visual Working Memory ◽  
Imaging Techniques ◽  
Event Related Potentials ◽  
Neural Mechanisms ◽  
Electrophysiological Studies ◽  
Related Potentials ◽  
Memory Representations ◽  
Α Band

Visual working memory (VWM) allows humans to actively maintain a limited amount of information. Whereas previous electrophysiological studies have found that lateralized event-related potentials (ERPs) track the maintenance of information in VWM, recent imaging experiments have shown that spatially global representations can be read out using the activity across the visual cortex. The goal of the present study was to determine whether both lateralized and spatially global electrophysiological signatures coexist. We first show that it is possible to simultaneously measure lateralized ERPs that track the number of items held in VWM from one visual hemfield and parietooccipital α (8–12 Hz) power over both hemispheres indexing spatially global VWM representations. Next, we replicated our findings and went on to show that this bilateral parietooccipital α power as well as the contralaterally biased ERP correlate of VWM carries a signal that can be used to decode the identity of the representations stored in VWM. Our findings not only unify observations across electrophysiology and imaging techniques but also suggest that ERPs and α-band oscillations index different neural mechanisms that map on to lateralized and spatially global representations, respectively.

Human Event-Related Potentials to Higher-Order Acoustic Spatial Changes

2002 ◽  
Vol 16 (2) ◽  
pp. 114-118 ◽  
Author(s):  
Timo Ruusuvirta ◽  
Heikki Hämäläinen
Keyword(s):  
Working Memory ◽  
Mismatch Negativity ◽  
Spatial Information ◽  
Free Field ◽  
Event Related Potentials ◽  
Negative Polarity ◽  
Positive Polarity ◽  
Spatial Changes ◽  
Related Potentials ◽  
Human Event

Abstract Human event-related potentials (ERPs) to a tone continuously alternating between its two spatial loci of origin (middle-standards, left-standards), to repetitions of left-standards (oddball-deviants), and to the tones originally representing these repetitions presented alone (alone-deviants) were recorded in free-field conditions. During the recordings (Fz, Cz, Pz, M1, and M2 referenced to nose), the subjects watched a silent movie. Oddball-deviants elicited a spatially diffuse two-peaked deflection of positive polarity. It differed from a deflection elicited by left-standards and commenced earlier than a prominent deflection of negative polarity (N1) elicited by alone-deviants. The results are discussed in the context of the mismatch negativity (MMN) and previous findings of dissociation between spatial and non-spatial information in auditory working memory.

scholarly journals State anxiety influences P300 and P600 event-related potentials over parietal regions in the hollow-mask illusion experiment

2021 ◽  
Vol 4 ◽  
Author(s):  
Vasileios Ioakeimidis ◽  
Nareg Khachatoorian ◽  
Corinna Haenschel ◽  
Thomas A. Papathomas ◽  
Attila Farkas ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
State Anxiety ◽  
Event Related Potentials ◽  
Memory Representation ◽  
High State ◽  
Opposite Pattern ◽  
Active Representation ◽  
Attentional Resources ◽  
Related Potentials ◽  
Memory Representations ◽  
Healthy Participants

Abstract The hollow-mask illusion is an optical illusion where a concave face is perceived as convex. It has been demonstrated that individuals with schizophrenia and anxiety are less susceptible to the illusion than controls. Previous research has shown that the P300 and P600 event-related potentials (ERPs) are affected in individuals with schizophrenia. Here, we examined whether individual differences in neuroticism and anxiety scores, traits that have been suggested to be risk factors for schizophrenia and anxiety disorders, affect ERPs of healthy participants while they view concave faces. Our results confirm that the participants were susceptible to the illusion, misperceiving concave faces as convex. We additionally demonstrate significant interactions of the concave condition with state anxiety in central and parietal electrodes for P300 and parietal areas for P600, but not with neuroticism and trait anxiety. The state anxiety interactions were driven by low-state anxiety participants showing lower amplitudes for concave faces compared to convex. The P300 and P600 amplitudes were smaller when a concave face activated a convex face memory representation, since the stimulus did not match the active representation. The opposite pattern was evident in high-state anxiety participants in regard to state anxiety interaction and the hollow-mask illusion, demonstrating larger P300 and P600 amplitudes to concave faces suggesting impaired late information processing in this group. This could be explained by impaired allocation of attentional resources in high-state anxiety leading to hyperarousal to concave faces that are unexpected mismatches to standard memory representations, as opposed to expected convex faces.

scholarly journals Temporal Dynamics of Attention during Encoding versus Maintenance of Working Memory: Complementary Views from Event-related Potentials and Alpha-band Oscillations

2015 ◽  
Vol 27 (3) ◽  
pp. 492-508 ◽  
Author(s):  
Nicholas E. Myers ◽  
Lena Walther ◽  
George Wallis ◽  
Mark G. Stokes ◽  
Anna C. Nobre
Keyword(s):  
Working Memory ◽  
Visual Information ◽  
Temporal Dynamics ◽  
Recall Performance ◽  
Event Related Potentials ◽  
Alpha Band ◽  
Related Potentials ◽  
Frontoparietal Control Network ◽  
Anticipatory Attention ◽  
Processing Differences

Working memory (WM) is strongly influenced by attention. In visual WM tasks, recall performance can be improved by an attention-guiding cue presented before encoding (precue) or during maintenance (retrocue). Although precues and retrocues recruit a similar frontoparietal control network, the two are likely to exhibit some processing differences, because precues invite anticipation of upcoming information whereas retrocues may guide prioritization, protection, and selection of information already in mind. Here we explored the behavioral and electrophysiological differences between precueing and retrocueing in a new visual WM task designed to permit a direct comparison between cueing conditions. We found marked differences in ERP profiles between the precue and retrocue conditions. In line with precues primarily generating an anticipatory shift of attention toward the location of an upcoming item, we found a robust lateralization in late cue-evoked potentials associated with target anticipation. Retrocues elicited a different pattern of ERPs that was compatible with an early selection mechanism, but not with stimulus anticipation. In contrast to the distinct ERP patterns, alpha-band (8–14 Hz) lateralization was indistinguishable between cue types (reflecting, in both conditions, the location of the cued item). We speculate that, whereas alpha-band lateralization after a precue is likely to enable anticipatory attention, lateralization after a retrocue may instead enable the controlled spatiotopic access to recently encoded visual information.

Abnormal auditory N400 in a case of zolpidem dependence, during a working memory test

2006 ◽  
Vol 21 (2) ◽  
pp. 135-137 ◽  
Author(s):  
Ioannis A. Liappas ◽  
Charalabos C. Papageorgiou ◽  
Andreas D. Rabavilas
Keyword(s):  
Working Memory ◽  
Spatial Working Memory ◽  
Event Related Potentials ◽  
Short Term ◽  
Context Processing ◽  
Gaba A ◽  
Related Potentials ◽  
N400 Component ◽  
Underlying Mechanisms ◽  
Term Management

AbstractZolpidem is a GABA (A) agonist, which is indicated for the short-term management of insomnia. Recent research provide evidence suggesting that zolpidem produces spatial working memory (WM) deficits and dependence; however, the underlying mechanisms of these effects are unknown. Since the auditory N400 component of event-related potentials (ERPS) is considered as an index of memory use of context processing, the present study focused on N400 waveform of ERPs elicited during a WM task in a case suffering from zolpidem dependence. The patterns of N400 waveform of this case were compared to the patterns obtained from healthy controls. This comparison revealed that zolpidem dependence is accompanied by reduced amplitudes located at posterior brain areas and diffuse prolongation of N400. These findings may indicate that zolpidem dependence manifests alterations with regard to the memory use of context processing, involving or affecting a wide-ranging network of the brain's structures.

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

2019 ◽  
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.

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