Institute of Brain and Psychological Sciences, Sichuan Normal University, Chengdu, China.
Department of Psychology, University of Jyvaskyla, Jyvaskyla, Finland.
Sci Rep. 2021 Mar 31;11(1):7258. doi: 10.1038/s41598-021-86515-5.
Previous studies have associated visual working memory (VWM) capacity with the use of internal attention. Retrocues, which direct internal attention to a particular object or feature dimension, can improve VWM performance (i.e., retrocue benefit, RCB). However, so far, no study has investigated the relationship between VWM capacity and the magnitudes of RCBs obtained from object-based and dimension-based retrocues. The present study explored individual differences in the magnitudes of object- and dimension-based RCBs and their relationships with VWM capacity. Participants completed a VWM capacity measurement, an object-based cue task, and a dimension-based cue task. We confirmed that both object- and dimension-based retrocues could improve VWM performance. We also found a significant positive correlation between the magnitudes of object- and dimension-based RCB indexes, suggesting a partly overlapping mechanism between the use of object- and dimension-based retrocues. However, our results provided no evidence for a correlation between VWM capacity and the magnitudes of the object- or dimension-based RCBs. Although inadequate attention control is usually assumed to be associated with VWM capacity, the results suggest that the internal attention mechanism for using retrocues in VWM retention is independent of VWM capacity.
先前的研究将视觉工作记忆（VWM）容量与内部注意的使用联系起来。回溯线索将内部注意引导到特定的对象或特征维度，可以提高 VWM 表现（即回溯线索收益，RCB）。然而，到目前为止，还没有研究调查 VWM 容量与基于对象和基于维度的回溯线索获得的 RCB 幅度之间的关系。本研究探讨了基于对象和基于维度的 RCB 幅度的个体差异及其与 VWM 容量的关系。参与者完成了 VWM 容量测量、基于对象的线索任务和基于维度的线索任务。我们证实，基于对象和基于维度的回溯线索都可以提高 VWM 表现。我们还发现基于对象和基于维度的 RCB 指数的幅度之间存在显著的正相关，这表明基于对象和基于维度的回溯线索的使用之间存在部分重叠的机制。然而，我们的结果没有提供 VWM 容量与基于对象或基于维度的 RCB 幅度之间存在相关性的证据。尽管通常认为注意力控制不足与 VWM 容量有关，但结果表明，在 VWM 保持中使用回溯线索的内部注意机制与 VWM 容量无关。
