Working Memory and Focal Attention

Overview

Journal J Exp Psychol Learn Mem Cogn

Publisher American Psychological Association

Specialty Psychology

Date 2001 Jun 8

PMID 11394682

Citations 134

Authors

B McElree

Affiliations

Soon will be listed here.

Abstract

Measures of retrieval speed indicated that only a small subset of representations in working memory falls within the focus of attention. An n-back task, which required tracking an item 1, 2, or 3 back in a sequentially presented list, was used to examine the representation and retrieval of recent events and how control processes can be used to maintain an item in focal attention while concurrently processing new information. A speed-accuracy trade-off procedure was used to derive measures of the availability and the speed with which recent events can be accessed. Results converge with other time course studies in demonstrating that attention can be concurrently allocated only to a small number of memory representations, perhaps just 1 item. Measures of retrieval speed further demonstrate that order information is retrieved by a slow search process when an item is not maintained within focal attention.

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