On the disruption of visual memory: interference produced by visual report cues.

Abstract

Report of single letters from centrally-fixated, seven-letter, target rows was probed by either auditory or visual cues. The target rows were presented for 100 ms, and the report cues were single digits which indicated the spatial location of a letter. In three separate experiments, report was always better with the auditory cues. The advantage for the auditory cues was maintained both when target rows were masked by a patterned stimulus and when the auditory cues were presented 500 ms later than comparable visual cues. The results indicate that visual cues produce modality-specific interference which operates at a level of processing beyond iconic representation.