Limited capacity for the visual working memory-driven access to visual awareness.

Previous studies have shown that sensory information matching the content of visual working memory (VWM) gains prioritized access into awareness. While these studies primarily focused on a single stimulus, it remains unclear whether the prioritization persists when multiple items are memorized. Using a breaking continuous flash suppression paradigm, the current study systematically investigated the time taken to detect a suppressed stimulus when two items were maintained in VWM.

Expectation violation enhances short-term source memory.

Recent studies of short-term source amnesia demonstrated that source information is rapidly forgotten in memory, reflecting a highly selective mode of memory encoding. In this study, we explored the flexibility of memory selection by investigating whether short-term source amnesia is affected by expectation violations. In seven experiments, we first replicated the short-term source amnesia phenomenon and then induced various forms of expectation violations.

Testing the memory encoding cost theory using the multiple cues paradigm.

Recent developments have introduced the Memory Encoding Cost (MEC) theory to explain the role of attention in exogenous spatial cueing effects. According to this theory, the cost effect (when comparing invalid to neutral cues) arises from attentional suppression resulting from memory encoding of the cue. Conversely, the benefit effect (when comparing valid to neutral cues) is thought to result from a combination of attentional facilitation caused by the cue and encoding-related attentional suppression.

The object as the unit for state switching in visual working memory.

This study aimed to determine the unit for switching representational states in visual working memory (VWM). Two opposing hypotheses were investigated: (a) the unit of switching being a feature (feature-based hypothesis), and (b) the unit of switching being an object (object-based hypothesis). Participants (N = 180) were instructed to hold two features from either one or two objects in their VWM.

Children exhibit superior memory for attended but outdated information compared to adults.

Research on the development of cognitive selectivity predominantly focuses on attentional selection. The present study explores another facet of cognitive selectivity-memory selection-by examining the ability to filter attended yet outdated information in young children and adults. Across five experiments involving 130 children and 130 adults, participants are instructed to use specific information to complete a task, and then unexpectedly asked to report this information in a surprise test.

Unconscious prioritization for face-to-face people.

One central question in the scientific and philosophical study of consciousness is regarding the scope of human consciousness. There is a lively debate as to whether high-level information integration is necessarily dependent on consciousness. This study presents a new form of unconscious integration based on the facingness between two individuals.

Attention with or without working memory: mnemonic reselection of attended information.

Attention has been regarded as the 'gatekeeper' controlling what information gets selected into working memory. However, a new perspective has emerged with the discovery of attribute amnesia, a phenomenon revealing that people are frequently unable to report information they have just attended to moments ago. This report failure is thought to stem from a lack of consolidating the attended information into working memory, indicating a dissociation between attention and working memory.

The linear impact of visual working memory load on visual awareness: Evidence from motion-induced blindness.

Despite the close relationship between visual working memory (VWM) and visual awareness, the question of how these two constructs interact with each other is still under debate. The current study aimed to further address this issue by investigating whether and how visual awareness is influenced by VWM load. In Experiment 1, participants were asked to perform a motion-induced blindness (MIB) task while simultaneously memorizing different numbers of items in VWM.

More attention with less working memory: The active inhibition of attended but outdated information.

Attention has traditionally been regarded as a gateway to working memory, and almost all theoretical frameworks of attention and working memory assume that individuals always have a better memory for information that has received more attention. Here, we provide a series of counterintuitive demonstrations that show that paying more attention to a piece of information impedes, rather than enhances, the selection of this information into working memory. Experiments 1 to 5 provide converging evidence for an even weaker working memory trace of fully attended but outdated features, compared with baseline irrelevant features that were completely ignored.

Does consciousness overflow cognitive access? Novel insights from the new phenomenon of attribute amnesia.

The moment we open our eyes, we experience a rich and detailed visual world, but the amount of information available to report is rather limited. This dissociation relates to a major debate regarding the nature of visual consciousness. The overflow argument suggests that our conscious experience is quite rich and far beyond what can be reported, standing in sharp contrast to the no-overflow argument that visual consciousness is severely impoverished and limited to what can be reported.

Consciousness can overflow report: Novel evidence from attribute amnesia of a single stimulus.

There is a long-standing debate on whether visual consciousness is confined to cognitive access measured by reportability, or whether it is rich and overflows reportability. Much of the debate in previous studies concentrated on whether information outside attentional focus could be consciously experienced and reportable. This study sought to address the debate from a new perspective, through testing whether fully attended supraliminal information is necessarily reportable with a variation of attribute amnesia.

Source information is inherently linked to working memory representation for auditory but not for visual stimuli.

Failing to remember the source of retrievable information is known as source amnesia. This phenomenon has been extensively investigated in long-term memory but rarely in working memory, as we share the intuition that the source information of an item that we have encountered in the immediate past is always available. However, a recent study (Chen, Carlson, & Wyble, 2018) challenged this common sense by showing the source amnesia for simple visual stimuli (e.

Does attribute amnesia occur with the presentation of complex, meaningful stimuli? The answer is, "it depends".

Attribute amnesia (AA) is a recently reported phenomenon whereby participants are unable to report a salient attribute of a stimulus (e.g., the color or identity of a target letter) on which their attention has just been focused during a prior task.