Previous research has variably indicated the role of working memory in error detection by which working memory played a role in rhythmic error detection but not melodic error detection. Here, we devised a longer melodic error detection task for college musicians in an auditory, rather than visual, condition using classical excerpts, which we…

Memory representations can be stored in a passive state in a visual working memory (VWM) task. However, it remains unclear whether the representations stored in the passive state are prone to interference and decay. To explore this issue, we asked participants to successively remember two sets of memory items (M1 and M2) in three test manners: a…

There is a long-standing debate over whether the passage of time causes forgetting from working memory, a process called trace decay. Researchers providing evidence against the existence of trace decay generally study memory by presenting familiar verbal memory items for 1 s or more per memory item, during the study period. In contrast,…

In 8 experiments, we investigated motion fluency effects on object preference. In each experiment, distinct objects were repeatedly seen moving either fluently (with a smooth and predictable motion) or disfluently (with sudden and unpredictable direction changes) in a task where participants were required to respond to occasional brief changes in…

This study investigated developmental memory capacity through picture span and feature binding. Participants included third grade students and college age adults with typical development. Picture span was used to assess working memory capacity when participants were asked to identify, locate, and sequence common visual-graphic symbols from…

We investigated whether clustering based on feature similarity improves the representational quality of visual working memory (VWM). We hypothesized that similar items are organized into clusters, and their recall precision increases with fewer clusters because of reduced memory load. In a series of 6 experiments, participants remembered…

Sequences of auditory objects such as one-syllable words or brief sounds disrupt serial recall of visually presented targets even when the auditory objects are completely irrelevant for the task at hand. The "token set size effect" is a label for the claim that disruption increases only when moving from a 1-token distractor sequence…

Provided stimuli are highly distinct, the detection of changes between two briefly separated arrays appears to be achieved by an all-or-none process where either the relevant information is in working memory or observers guess. This observation suggests that it is possible to estimate the average number of items an observer was able to retain…

Working memory (WM) enables a rapid access to a limited number of items that are no longer physically present. WM studies usually involve the encoding and retention of multiple items, while probing a single item only. Hence, little is known about how well multiple items can be reported from WM. Here we asked participants to successively report…

In 2 experiments, participants were presented with lists of between 2 and 12 words for either immediate free recall (IFR) or immediate serial recall (ISR). Auditory recall advantages at the end of the list (modality effects) and visual recall advantages early in the list (inverse modality effects) were observed in both tasks and the extent and…

Events consist of diverse elements, each processed in specialized neocortical networks, with temporal lobe memory systems binding these elements to form coherent event memories. We provide a novel theoretical analysis of an unexplored consequence of the independence of memory systems for elements and their bindings, 1 that raises the paradoxical…

How does orthographic distinctiveness affect recall of structured (categorized) word lists? On one theory, enhanced item-specific information (e.g., more distinct encoding) in concert with robust relational information (e.g., categorical information) optimally supports free recall. This predicts that for categorically structured lists,…

In recognition memory, "recollection" is defined as retrieval of the context associated with an event, whereas "familiarity" is defined as retrieval based on item strength alone. Recent studies have shown that conventional recollection-based tasks, in which context details are manipulated for source memory assessment at test,…

Short-term memory (STM) for serially presented visual items is disrupted by task-irrelevant, to-beignored speech. Five experiments investigated the extent to which irrelevant speech is processed semantically by contrasting the following two hypotheses: (1) semantic processing of irrelevant speech is limited and does not interfere with serial STM…

In this article, we demonstrate limitations of accessibility of information in visual working memory (VWM). Recently, cued-recall has been used to estimate the fidelity of information in VWM, where the feature of a cued object is reproduced from memory (Bays, Catalao, & Husain, 2009; Wilken & Ma, 2004; Zhang & Luck, 2008). Response…