Abstracts 2005 - The Psychonomic Society

Saturday Noon Posters 4051–4056
lists of words, one “read” (i.e., whole words) and the other “selfgenerated”
(word fragment completion). Each block was followed by
a recognition test. Generating studied items increased the tendency for
7- to 8-year-old children to recollect those items, as compared with
having read them. In contrast, 10- to 11-year-old children relied more
heavily on graded similarity judgments when accepting studied items
that had been generated, in comparison with studied items that were
read. These findings are consistent with a fuzzy-trace theory account
of memory development.
(4051)
Role of Experimental Design and Age on the Generation Effect.
LAURENCE TACONNAT, MATHILDE SACHER, DAVID CLARYS,
SANDRINE VANNESTE, & MICHEL ISINGRINI, Université de Tours
(sponsored by Naftali Raz)—The generation effect (e.g., generated
words are better recalled than read words: wall-hou__ (vs.) wallhouse)
was investigated in between-list and mixed-list designs in
young and elderly participants. The generation difficulty was also manipulated
by varying the strength of association between cues and targets.
The results showed different patterns of generation effect according
to the design, difficulty, and age, with a robust generation
effect in the mixed-list design whatever the participants’ age, corroborating
previous researches. In the between-list design, elderly participants
did never benefit from the generation effect, and in young
participants, the effect was elicited only when they generated strong
associates. Findings showed that the type of design did not allow implementation
of the same cognitive operations according to age. Contrary
to the generation effect in a mixed-list design, the generation effect
in a between-list design might be the consequence of effortful
processes, difficult to implement in elderly adults, whereas the generation
effect in a mixed-list design might be more automatic.
• WORKING MEMORY •
(4052)
Effects of Complexity on the Recall of Spatial Configurations.
AYSECAN BODURO ˇGLU & PRITI SHAH, University of Michigan—
Recent research has demonstrated that spatial working memory representations
preserve the overall configuration formed by a number
of attended locations. In a series of studies using the serial spatial recall
task, we investigated how configural complexity influences
(1) the independent recall of locations in a sequence and (2) the recall
of the overall configurations formed by a sequence. Configural complexity
was manipulated by varying the number of path crossings in
a spatial sequence (zero, one, or three). For highly complex sequences,
although complexity did not impact recall of independent locations,
it did impair how well the configurations were preserved, as compared
with simpler sequences. Results indicate that localization errors in
spatial recall tasks are influenced more by length of and serial position
in sequences, whereas orientations of errors are more influenced
by complexity of configurations. These findings highlight the dissociation
between distance and orientation errors for characterizing spatial
recall accuracy.
(4053)
Location-Based Versus Configurational Representations of Visuospatial
Information in Working Memory. LEON GMEINDL &
JAMES K. NELSON, University of Michigan, TIMOTHY D. WIGGIN,
Eastern Michigan University, & JENNIFER C. HSU & PATRICIA A.
REUTER-LORENZ, University of Michigan—Do people represent
multiple spatial targets in working memory (WM) as independent locations
or as configurations? In three delayed location matching-tosample
experiments, participants viewed three dots presented simultaneously
for 1,500 msec, followed 3 sec later by a three-dot probe. For
nonmatch probes, preserved configurations led to false alarms more
frequently than did distorted configurations, despite equivalent stimulus
displacements. Furthermore, a higher false alarm rate for pre-
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served configurations persisted when only a single probe stimulus was
designated as relevant by its unique color. In contrast, an arrow cue presented
prior to target presentation eliminated the increased false alarm
rate for probes with preserved configurations. We conclude that
(1) people utilize configurational information in WM representations
of multiple locations and (2) attentional processes can reduce the influence
of configurational information on WM representations.
(4054)
Is the Binding of Visual Features in Working Memory Resource-
Demanding? RICHARD J. ALLEN, ALAN D. BADDELEY, & GRA-
HAM J. HITCH, University of York (sponsored by Alan D. Baddeley)—
A series of experiments examined the processes underlying the encoding
and retention of visual feature bindings in working memory. Memory
for shapes or colors was compared with memory for combinations of
these features. When demanding concurrent verbal tasks were used,
with the intention of disrupting executive resources, visual memory
performance was significantly impaired. However, the effects were no
greater for memory for feature combinations than for the features
themselves. A comparison of simultaneous and sequential item presentations
revealed the combination condition to be significantly
worse in the latter, especially for items earlier in the sequence. The
findings are interpreted as evidence for a relatively fragile but automatic
visual feature binding mechanism in working memory, capable
of functioning without placing additional demands on the central executive.
This form of ‘unitized’ binding is then compared with the
binding of spatially separated features.
(4055)
Feature Binding in Visual Working Memory Without Continued
Attention. DANIEL A. GAJEWSKI & JAMES R. BROCKMOLE,
Michigan State University (sponsored by James R. Brockmole)—Are
integrated objects the unit of capacity of visual working memory, or
is continued attention needed to maintain bindings between independently
stored features? In a delayed recall task, participants reported
the color and shape of a probed item from a memory array. During the
delay, attention was manipulated with an exogenous cue. Recall was
elevated at validly cued positions, indicating that the cue affected item
memory. On invalid trials, participants most frequently recalled either
both features (perfect object memory) or neither of the two features
(no object memory); the frequency with which only one feature was
recalled was significantly lower than predicted by feature independence
as determined in a single-feature recall task. These data do not
support the view that features are remembered independently when attention
is withdrawn. Instead, integrated objects are stored in visual
working memory without need for continued attention.
(4056)
Eye Movements Reveal Strategic Interactions Between Perceptual
Attention and Visual Working Memory During Visual Search.
LEANNE BOUCHER & GEOFFREY F. WOODMAN, Vanderbilt
University—Theories of attention propose that maintaining a representation
in visual working memory guides perceptual attention to
similar items. However, a recent study showed that when participants
maintained a visual working memory representation and performed
visual search, the presence of a memory-matching distractor that was
never the target did not slow search. Here, we sought to more directly
measure selection by tracking observers’ eye movements. Eye
movement data revealed that search was faster when the memorymatching
distractor was in the array, because observers generally
avoided fixating this nontarget until search was completed. However,
after the search target was fixated and discriminated, subjects directed
gaze to the memory-matching item, consistent with a working memory
maintenance strategy of perceptual resampling. Thus, attention
can be biased toward or away from items that match the contents of
visual working memory, and these biases can dynamically change in
the service of different search and memory maintenance strategies.