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How visual working memory contents influence priming of visual attention

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Abstract

Recent evidence shows that when the contents of visual working memory overlap with targets and distractors in a pop-out search task, intertrial priming is inhibited (Kristjánsson, Sævarsson & Driver, Psychon Bull Rev 20(3):514–521, 2013, Experiment 2, Psychonomic Bulletin and Review). This may reflect an interesting interaction between implicit short-term memory—thought to underlie intertrial priming—and explicit visual working memory. Evidence from a non-pop-out search task suggests that it may specifically be holding distractors in visual working memory that disrupts intertrial priming (Cunningham & Egeth, Psychol Sci 27(4):476–485, 2016, Experiment 2, Psychological Science). We examined whether the inhibition of priming depends on whether feature values in visual working memory overlap with targets or distractors in the pop-out search, and we found that the inhibition of priming resulted from holding distractors in visual working memory. These results are consistent with separate mechanisms of target and distractor effects in intertrial priming, and support the notion that the impact of implicit short-term memory and explicit visual working memory can interact when each provides conflicting attentional signals.

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Notes

  1. A′ is derived from the more traditional d′ but is more accurate for tasks of this sort and is more robust to lacks of false alarms. It is calculated as follows: \(A^{\prime } = 0.5 + \left[ {\frac{(H - FA)(1 + H - FA)}{4H(1 - FA)}} \right]\).

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Acknowledgements

We would like to thank two anonymous reviewers for helpful suggestions on a previous version of this manuscript. This paper was supported by a Grant Nos. 152427 and 130575 from the Icelandic Research Fund (Rannís) and the Research Fund of the University of Iceland.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Psychology, Lehigh University, Bethlehem, USA

    Nancy B. Carlisle

  2. Department of Psychology, University of Iceland, Gimli v. Sturlugötu 101, Reykjavik, Iceland

    Árni Kristjánsson

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  1. Nancy B. Carlisle
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  2. Árni Kristjánsson
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Correspondence to Árni Kristjánsson.

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Carlisle, N.B., Kristjánsson, Á. How visual working memory contents influence priming of visual attention. Psychological Research 82, 833–839 (2018). https://doi.org/10.1007/s00426-017-0866-6

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