Li Ziyuan, Guo Wenjin, Zhao Na, Liu Qiang
Sichuan Normal University.
Anyang Normal University.
J Cogn Neurosci. 2025 Feb 1;37(2):334-344. doi: 10.1162/jocn_a_02265.
Recent studies of visual working memory (VWM) underscore a structured hierarchy of storage states. Memories that are not immediately relevant to the task at hand but are essential for later use are transferred to a passive state, which operates independently of actively maintaining and manipulating current memories. Note that stimulating passive memory forcefully can reactivate it into an active state, resulting in a competition with active memory. Thus, to remain stable representations for both states within VWM, passive memory might involve sustained suppression during activity-silent maintenance to prevent reactivation from disrupting the current active storage. To investigate this, we analyzed lateralized EEG signals while human participants (both women and men) were engaged in a sequential presentation memory task across two experiments. The results revealed positive contralateral delayed activity components and lateralized alpha enhancement for passive memory, neural indicative of suppression on passive storage. In addition, the suppression effect was independent of the memory load in both the active and the passive states. These findings support the notion of sustained suppression during activity-silent maintenance of passive memory, facilitating the stable maintenance of distinct storage states and advancing our understanding of the dynamic coding framework in VWM.
近期对视觉工作记忆（VWM）的研究强调了存储状态的结构化层次。与当前手头任务没有直接关联但对后续使用至关重要的记忆会被转移到一种被动状态，这种状态独立于积极维持和操作当前记忆而运行。请注意，强力刺激被动记忆会使其重新激活为活跃状态，从而导致与活跃记忆的竞争。因此，为了在VWM中使两种状态的表征都保持稳定，被动记忆可能在活动静默维持期间涉及持续抑制，以防止重新激活干扰当前的活跃存储。为了对此进行研究，我们在两项实验中分析了人类参与者（包括男性和女性）在进行顺序呈现记忆任务时的脑电信号侧向化情况。结果显示，对于被动记忆存在对侧延迟的正向活动成分和侧向化的阿尔法增强，这是对被动存储进行抑制的神经指标。此外，在活跃状态和被动状态下，抑制效应均与记忆负荷无关。这些发现支持了在被动记忆的活动静默维持期间存在持续抑制的观点，有助于不同存储状态的稳定维持，并推进了我们对VWM中动态编码框架的理解。
