Download or read book Investigating the Relationship Between Working Memory and Selective Attention written by Dion Henare and published by . This book was released on 2019 with total page 388 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Optimal performance of everyday tasks like driving depend critically on both the ability to store and retrieve small amounts of information in the short term, and the ability to selectively find and process relevant objects while preventing distraction. These two abilities have traditionally been viewed as distinct processes in human cognition, however research now demonstrates significant overlap between the constructs of working memory and selective attention. Previous work has established a role for working memory resources in the successful control of attention, however there are many processes underlying successful attentional control, and affecting any one of them would produce the pattern of results that have been observed. In this thesis we used behavioural and electroencephalographic evidence to investigate working memory and selective attention. We aim to provide a more detailed understanding of the processes underlying the relationship between these two constructs. Study 1 provided systematic documentation of the effect that distractor objects have on performance in a traditional working memory task, as well as the relationship between these effects and individual differences in working memory capacity. Study 2 used lateralized event-related potentials to measure dissociable components related to target selection, distractor capture, and distractor disengagement while working memory load was manipulated. Study 2 used electroencephalographic measures of attention processes to show that increased working memory load has a specific effect on neural indices of distractor disengagement. Study 3 used a similar paradigm to Study 2 to show that the presence of irrelevant objects during working memory encoding leads to impairments in performance and modulation of the neural response to targets in a concurrent visual search task. Together, our results provide greater specificity of the relationship between attention and working memory while demonstrating the utility of lateralized ERPs in providing dissociable measures of specific attentional sub-processes. This provides a promising tool for future research which investigates the relationship between working memory and selective attention.
Download or read book The Development of Memory in Infancy and Childhood written by Mary L. Courage and published by Psychology Press. This book was released on 2022-05-16 with total page 323 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The Development of Memory in Infancy and Childhood provides a thorough update and expansion of the previous edition and offers new research on significant themes and ideas that have emerged in the past decade such as the cognitive neuroscience of memory development, autobiographical memory and infantile amnesia, and the cognitive and social factors that underlie memory for events. In this volume, Courage and Cowan bring together leading international experts to review the current state of the science of memory development in their own research areas. They note questions of theory and basic science addressed in their research, highlight the real-world applications of those findings, and propose an agenda for future research. The book also considers the implications of their work for the development of atypical children, specifically, how these new findings might be adapted to enrich the lives of those children and to inform and validate our current expectations of individual differences in the development of typical children. The first of three groups of chapters focuses on basic neurobiological, perceptual, and cognitive processes that underlie memory and its development (i.e., encoding, consolidation and storage, retrieval). The second group focuses primarily on the social, contextual, and cultural factors that enable, shape, and mediate these basic processes, while the rest of the chapters focus on practical applications of this knowledge to real-world settings and issues. The book provides a new look at memory development, including new topics such as spatial representation and spatial working, prospective memory, false memories, and memory and culture. This classic yet contemporary volume will appeal to senior undergraduate and graduate students of developmental and cognitive psychology, as well as to developmental psychologists who want a compendium of key topics in memory development.
Download or read book Cognitive hearing science Investigating the relationship between selective attention and brain activity written by Jerker Rönnberg and published by Frontiers Media SA. This book was released on 2023-01-18 with total page 179 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt:
Download or read book New Research on Short term Memory written by Noah B. Johansen and published by Nova Science Publishers. This book was released on 2008 with total page 558 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Short-term memory, sometimes referred to as "primary", "working" or "active" memory, is said to hold a small amount of information for about 20 seconds. Estimates of short-term memory capacity vary -- from about 3 or 4 elements (i.e., words, digits, or letters) to about 9 elements: a commonly cited capacity is 7±2 elements. In contrast, long-term memory indefinitely stores a seemingly unlimited amount of information. Short-term memory can be described as the capacity (or capacities) for holding in mind, in an active, highly available state, a small amount of information. The information held in short-term memory may be: recently processed sensory input; items recently retrieved from long-term memory; or the result of recent mental processing, although that is more generally related to the concept of working memory. This book presents the latest research in the field from around the world.
Download or read book The Relationship Between Working Memory and Selective Attention written by Shery Mosad Halim Boktor Saad and published by . This book was released on 2010 with total page 0 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt:
Download or read book Working Memory Capacity written by Nelson Cowan and published by Psychology Press. This book was released on 2016-04-14 with total page 238 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The idea of one's memory "filling up" is a humorous misconception of how memory in general is thought to work; it actually has no capacity limit. However, the idea of a "full brain" makes more sense with reference to working memory, which is the limited amount of information a person can hold temporarily in an especially accessible form for use in the completion of almost any challenging cognitive task. This groundbreaking book explains the evidence supporting Cowan's theoretical proposal about working memory capacity, and compares it to competing perspectives. Cognitive psychologists profoundly disagree on how working memory is limited: whether by the number of units that can be retained (and, if so, what kind of units and how many), the types of interfering material, the time that has elapsed, some combination of these mechanisms, or none of them. The book assesses these hypotheses and examines explanations of why capacity limits occur, including vivid biological, cognitive, and evolutionary accounts. The book concludes with a discussion of the practical importance of capacity limits in daily life. This 10th anniversary Classic Edition will continue to be accessible to a wide range of readers and serve as an invaluable reference for all memory researchers.
Download or read book Turning the Mind s Eye Inward The Interplay between Selective Attention and Working Memory written by Elger Abrahamse and published by Frontiers Media SA. This book was released on 2016-01-21 with total page 172 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Historically, cognitive sciences have considered selective attention and working memory as largely separated cognitive functions. That is, selective attention as a concept is typically reserved for the processes that allow for the prioritization of specific sensory input, while working memory entails more central structures for maintaining (and operating on) temporary mental representations. However, over the last decades various observations have been reported that question such sharp distinction. Most importantly, information stored in working memory has been shown to modulate selective attention processing – and vice versa. At the theoretical level, these observations are paralleled by an increasingly dominant focus on working memory as (involving) the attended part of long-term memory, with some positions considering that working memory is equivalent to selective attention turned to long-term memory representations – or internal selective attention. This questions the existence of working memory as a dedicated cognitive function and raises the need for integrative accounts of working memory and attention. The next step will be to explore the precise implications of attentional accounts of WM for the understanding of specific aspects and characteristics of WM, such as serial order processing, its modality-specificity, its capacity limitations, its relation with executive functions, as well as the nature of attentional mechanisms involved. This research topic in Frontiers in Human Neuroscience aims at bringing together the latest insights and findings about the interplay between working memory and selective attention.
Download or read book Event Related Potential Study of Visual Selective Attention and Working Memory in Children written by Grace Wallsinger and published by . This book was released on 2023 with total page 0 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: One current model of visual selective attention proposes two mechanisms that work together to achieve processing of important information: facilitation - which controls the processing of relevant target stimuli - and suppression - which works to filter out irrelevant distracting stimuli. While facilitation is seen in all ages, previous research indicates suppression develops later in childhood (Plebanek & Sloutsky 2017; 2019; Wong-Kee-You et al., 2019). One theory regarding the development of selective attention is that it is linked to the development of working memory - given the functional and neural overlap between the two processes (Downing, 2000; LaBar et al., 2019). This study investigated the developmental timeline of suppression using electrophysiological methods to create a quantitative physiological measure of facilitation and suppression during visual selective attention using the P1/N1 event related potential (ERP) components for 24 adults and 12 children (8-12 years-old). Our results reveal a suppression effect of the N1 component for adults, but not for children; suggesting that suppression may not develop before the age of 12. Additionally, we discovered children reach adult levels for visual working memory capacity between the ages of 10-12 years-old; and that for children only, visual working memory capacity has a significant interaction with attention ability. This indicates that working memory capacity develops earlier and may influence later development of selective attention skills - including suppression. Understanding the development of attention and working memory will provide useful information in creating effective classroom management strategies and enhancing the focus of task-related information to foster childhood learning.
Download or read book Interactions Between Selective Attention and Working Memory in Emotion Regulation written by Ravi Thiruchselvam and published by . This book was released on 2014 with total page pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Selective attention and working memory (WM) are central to our ability to internally represent and act on the world, and a growing body of research suggests that the two interact in several ways. These interactions hold critical implications for emotion regulation, as they may underlie distinct forms of cognitive control that enable individuals to alter emotion. In this dissertation, I examine two types of selective attention-working memory interactions that may be important for emotion regulation: the gating of affective content into WM, and the biasing of affective content active within WM. Study 1 examined the immediate and delayed emotional consequences of controlling the gating of affective content into WM. Participants were presented with affective (and neutral) images during two phases. In an initial regulation phase, participants attempted to restrict the access of image representations into WM by loading WM with unrelated content. In a subsequent re-exposure phase, participants simply attended to these images. Results showed that, during the regulatory episode, loading WM while exposed to images rapidly and powerfully attenuated a robust electrocortical index of emotional response, the late positive potential (LPP). Upon re-exposure, however, images with a WM-load history paradoxically elicited heightened LPP responses (compared to images with a simple-viewing history). This pattern of findings diverged significantly from those obtained for another major form of emotion regulation -- cognitive reappraisal -- that permits encoding affective inputs into WM. Together, these results suggest that blocking the access of affective events into WM can quickly dampen emotion during the regulatory episode, a feature that may have unintended consequences upon passive re-exposure. Study 2 examined the emotional consequences of biasing affective content active within WM. Participants were cued to attend to either an arousing or neutral aspect of an affective image representation maintained within WM. Results showed that, relative to focusing on an arousing portion of a negative image representation within WM, focusing on a neutral portion reduced both LPP responses and self-reported negative emotion. These data suggest that deploying attention within affective representations active within WM can successfully alter emotion. Study 3 sought to replicate the findings obtained in Study 2, using a novel system to record electrocortical responses. Even under different recording conditions, results showed strong preservation of the original findings. Specifically, attending to a neutral (versus arousing) aspect of an unpleasant image representation within WM reduced both LPP responses and self-reported negative emotion. Study 4 examined whether the ability to bias affective content within WM via attention is impaired in a particular form of psychopathology -- generalized anxiety disorder (GAD) -- that may be characterized by deficits in the control of affective WM representations. Participants diagnosed with GAD and never-disordered healthy control (HC) participants were cued to attend to either an arousing or neutral aspect of an affective image representation active within WM. Contrary to predictions, results showed a failure to replicate the original findings in HC participants. Although the GAD group showed an inability to dampen LPP responses by shifting attention to neutral (versus arousing) aspects of affective WM content, the pattern of results is inconclusive due to a lack of expected findings in the HC group. Future studies will need to clarify the causes underlying the unexpected pattern of results amongst healthy participants.
Download or read book Handbook of Individual Differences in Cognition written by Aleksandra Gruszka and published by Springer Science & Business Media. This book was released on 2010-06-16 with total page 494 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: As cognitive models of behavior continue to evolve, the mechanics of cognitive exceptionality, with its range of individual variations in abilities and performance, remains a challenge to psychology. Reaching beyond the standard view of exceptional cognition equaling superior intelligence, the Handbook of Individual Differences in Cognition examines the latest findings from psychobiology, cognitive psychology, and neuroscience, for a comprehensive state-of-the-art volume. Breaking down cognition in terms of attentional mechanisms, working memory, and higher-order processing, contributors discuss general models of cognition and personality. Chapter authors build on this foundation as they revisit current theory in such areas as processing effort and general arousal and examine emerging methods in individual differences research, including new data on the role of brain plasticity in cognitive function. The possibility of a unified theory of individual differences in cognitive ability and the extent to which these variables may account for real-world competencies are emphasized, and commentary chapters offer suggestions for further research priorities. Coverage highlights include: The relationship between cognition and temperamental traits. The development of autobiographical memory. Anxiety and attentional control. The neurophysiology of gender differences in cognitive ability. Intelligence and cognitive control. Individual differences in dual task coordination. The effects of subclinical depression on attention, memory, and reasoning. Mood as a shaper of information. Researchers, clinicians, and graduate students in psychology and cognitive sciences, including clinical psychology and neuropsychology, personality and social psychology, neuroscience, and education, will find the Handbook of Individual Differences in Cognition an expert guide to the field as it currently stands and to its agenda for the future.
Download or read book Attention and Memory written by Nelson Cowan and published by Oxford University Press. This book was released on 1998-01-15 with total page 342 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Attention and Memory brings together and assesses past and present research on information processing, to formulate a model of this entire system.
Download or read book Variation in Working Memory written by Andrew Conway and published by Oxford University Press. This book was released on 2008-02-13 with total page 347 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Working memory--the ability to keep important information in mind while comprehending, thinking, and acting--varies considerably from person to person and changes dramatically during each person's life. Understanding such individual and developmental differences is crucial because working memory is a major contributor to general intellectual functioning. This volume offers a state-of-the-art, integrative, and comprehensive approach to understanding variation in working memory by presenting explicit, detailed comparisons of the leading theories. It incorporates views from the different research groups that operate on each side of the Atlantic, and covers working-memory research on a wide variety of populations, including healthy adults, children with and without learning difficulties, older adults, and adults and children with neurological disorders. A particular strength of this volume is that each research group explicitly addresses the same set of theoretical questions, from the perspective of both their own theoretical and experimental work and from the perspective of relevant alternative approaches. Through these questions, each research group considers their overarching theory of working memory, specifies the critical sources of working memory variation according to their theory, reflects on the compatibility of their approach with other approaches, and assesses their contribution to general working memory theory. This shared focus across chapters unifies the volume and highlights the similarities and differences among the various theories. Each chapter includes both a summary of research positions and a detailed discussion of each position. Variation in Working Memory achieves coherence across its chapters, while presenting the entire range of current theoretical and experimental approaches to variation in working memory.
Download or read book Working Memory and Learning written by Susan Gathercole and published by SAGE. This book was released on 2008-01-09 with total page 146 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Dr Tracy Alloway has been awarded the prestigious Joseph Lister Award from the British Science Association. ′The authors have written a guide for practitioners that is both highly practical, and yet based upon sound theoretical principles....This book achieves a successful, yet often elusive, link between theory, research and practice, and deserves to have a high readership. I will have no hesitation in recommending it to a range of readers′ - Jane Mott, Support for Learning ′This book fulfils its aim to explain working memory and the limits it places on children′s classroom learning. For teachers it gives a very clear guide and fills a gap in understanding that can only lead to more child-centred approaches to teaching and learning′ - Lynn Ambler, Support for Learning ′A clear and accessible account of current theory and research, which is then applied to children′s learning in the classroom....The range of strategies...are well grounded in theory derived from research and sit within a coherent conceptual model′ - The Psychologist ′An easy to read yet informative book that explains the concepts clearly and offers practitioners ways to support those with poor working memory in the classroom′ - SNIP `The topic of working memory nowadays tends to dominate discussions with teachers and parents, and both groups can helpfully be directed to this easy-to-read but serious text ... (it) is likely to prove a turning-point in the management and facilitation of hard-to-teach children. In a situation muddied by ever-multiplying syndromes and disorders, this book delivers a clarifying and reassuring isolation of the major cognitive characteristic that cuts across all the boundaries and leaves the class teacher and SENCO empowered. I think very highly of the book and shall be recommending it steadily′ - Martin Turner, Child Center for Evaluation and Teaching, Kuwait Susan Gathercole is winner of the British Psychological Society′s President′s Award for 2007 A good working memory is crucial to becoming a successful learner, yet there is very little material available in an easy-to-use format that explains the concept and offers practitioners ways to support children with poor working memory in the classroom. This book provides a coherent overview of the role played by working memory in learning during the school years, and uses theory to inform good practice. Topics covered include: - the link between working memory skills and key areas of learning (such as literacy & numeracy) - the relationship between working memory and children with developmental disorders - assessment of children for working memory deficits - strategies for supporting working memory in under-performing children This accessible guide will help SENCOs, teachers, teaching assistants, speech and language therapists and educational psychologists to understand and address working memory in their setting.
Download or read book The Cognitive Neuroscience of Working Memory written by Naoyuki Osaka and published by . This book was released on 2007 with total page 418 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: It is only relatively recently that it has been possible to study the neural processes that might underlie working memory, leading to a proliferation of research in this domain. This volume brings together leading researchers from around the world to summarise current knowledge of this field.
Download or read book The Relationship Between Working Memory and Distractor Processing in Visual Selective Attention written by Lenore Tamami Tahara-Eckl and published by . This book was released on 2018 with total page 248 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Selective attention is the ability to attend to relevant information, while disregarding irrelevant information. Neural signatures of selective attention include event-related lateralisations of both the negative (N2pc) and the positive (Ptc) voltage, which are suggested to reflect visual target enhancement and distractor suppression, respectively. Our prior research found that more salient visual items elicited an earlier and stronger Ptc with improved performance, while the opposite was true for less salient items. Additionally, high working memory capacity (HWMC) participants performed better with a tentatively stronger Ptc than low working memory capacity (LWMC) participants. We followed up our preliminary results with two experiments that further investigated these lateralised components and cognitive capacity. Experiment 1 investigated whether a modified localised attentional interference (LAI) task would show WMC differences. A ‘memory probe’ required observers to recall a certain element in the task after a set number of trials. Individuals who performed better on the memory probe performed better on the LAI task. We also found that the LWMC group exhibited a compensatory process, which showed that while they distinguished between the distractors more, they performed worse on the memory probe than the higher WMC groups. Experiment 2 investigated whether a more salient distractor would elicit a stronger Ptc signal and draw stronger neural differences in WMC. We found that the Ptc amplitude was the same and overall small for both distractor conditions, suggesting that suppression may not have been needed due to the greater physical differences between the distractors. We also found that HWMC participants elicited a late N2pc, postulated as higher cognitive functioning. All things considered, our studies suggest that the Ptc does not necessarily reflect stronger suppression, and that other qualities may reveal finer details of one’s cognitive capacity.
Download or read book The Relationship Between Working Memory and Inhibition written by Donna Bayliss and published by . This book was released on 2003 with total page 672 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt:
Download or read book Attention written by Addie Johnson and published by SAGE. This book was released on 2004 with total page 489 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Attention: Theory and Practice provides a balance between a readable overview of attention and an emphasis on how theories and paradigms for the study of attention have developed. The book highlights the important issues and major findings while giving sufficient details of experimental studies, models, and theories so that results and conclusions are easy to follow and evaluate. Rather than brushing over tricky technical details, the authors explain them clearly, giving readers the benefit of understanding the motivation for and techniques of the experiments in order to allow readers to think through results, models, and theories for themselves. Attention is an accessible text for advanced undergraduate and graduate students in psychology, as well as an important resource for researchers and practitioners interested in gaining an overview of the field of attention.
