Abstract
What influences the extent to which perceptual information interferes with the contents of visual working memory? In two experiments using a combination of change detection and continuous reproduction tasks, I show that binding novelty is a key factor in producing interference. In Experiment 2, participants viewed arrays of colored circles, then completed consecutive change detection and recall tests of their memory for stochastically independent items from the same array. When the probe used in the change detection test was novel (i.e., required a “change” response), subsequent recall performance was worse than in trials with matching (i.e., “no change”) probes, irrespective of whether or not the same item was tested in both phases. In Experiment 2, participants viewed arrays of oriented arrows, then completed a change detection (requiring memory) or direction judgement (not requiring memory) test, followed by recalling a stochastically independent item. Again, novel probes in the first phase led to worse recall, irrespective of whether the initial task required memory. This effect held whether the probe was wholly novel (i.e., a new feature presented at any location) or simply involved a novel binding (i.e., an old feature presented at a new location). These findings highlight the role of novelty in visual interference, consistent with the assumptions of computational models of WM, and suggest that new bindings of old information are sufficient to produce such interference.
Highlights
One of the key characteristics of working memory (WM) is its flexibility (e.g., Gilchrist & Cowan, 2014; Oberauer, Souza, Druey, & Gade, 2013; Shipstead, Harrison, & Engle, 2016)
As was the case for same-item trials, change detection probe type affected recall performance (BF = 10.14 for model with vs. without main effect of probe type): Recall error was lower following positive probes than following negative probes (BF = 18.00), but the evidence was ambiguous regarding differences between recall following intrusion probes and positive probes (BF = 1.03) or negative probes (BF = 1.05). This is consistent with the idea that novel distractors interfere more with the contents of visual WM, but leaves ambiguous the question of whether presenting an entirely new feature is necessary to cause greater interference
Same-item trials Panel (a) of Fig. 4 shows recall error for CD+R and direction judgement” (DJ)+R trials where the same item was tested in both phases, separately for trials with the three different types of change detection probes
Summary
One of the key characteristics of working memory (WM) is its flexibility (e.g., Gilchrist & Cowan, 2014; Oberauer, Souza, Druey, & Gade, 2013; Shipstead, Harrison, & Engle, 2016). As a severely capacity-limited system, this flexibility is vital in ensuring its usefulness. In the experiments described here, I examined how one particular characteristic of distracting perceptual information—namely, its novelty—affects the extent to which it undermines people’s ability to retain existing task-relevant information in memory. Stimulus novelty is detected even when stimuli are not attended (Tarbi, Sun, Holcomb, & Daffner, 2011), and novel stimuli better capture attention (Escera, Alho, Winkler, & Raatanen, 1998) and are encoded more effectively into episodic longterm memory compared to non-novel stimuli (Tulving & Kroll, 1995)
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