Two Visual Stores and Two Processing Operations in Tachistoscopic Partial Report

Abstract

A two-stage interpretation of the processes underlying tachistoscopic partial report performance is suggested. It is assumed that partial report is mediated by two kinds of visual store (a sensory store and a short-term store) and by two processing operations (selection and naming). In Experiment I, the accuracy and latency of two types of partial report (report by location and report by colour) were compared for cue stimulus-test stimulus intervals ranging from —500 ms to + 500 ms. It was concluded that selection by colour takes longer than selection by location; an explanation in terms of differential decay of attributes in the sensory store was rejected. In Experiment II, cue stimulus delays of 0, 150 and 300 ms were employed, and a backward masking stimulus followed the cue stimulus with a delay of 200, 300, 400 or 600 ms. The amount of masking depended on the cue stimulus-masking stimulus interval, rather than on the test stimulus-masking stimulus interval. It was concluded that selection operates on the sensory store and that backward masking can affect the naming of a stimulus representation which is residing in the visual short-term store.