To bind or not to bind, that's the wrong question: Features and objects coexist in visual short-term memory.

In three experiments, we investigated whether features and whole-objects can be represented simultaneously in visual short-term memory (VSTM). Participants were presented with a memory set of colored shapes; we probed either for the constituent features or for the whole object, and analyzed retrieval dynamics (cumulative response time distributions). In our first experiment, we used whole-object probes that recombined features from the memory display; we found that subjects' data conformed to a kitchen-line model, showing that they used whole-object representations for the matching process.

Making working memory work: the effects of extended practice on focus capacity and the processes of updating, forward access, and random access.

We investigated the effects of 10h of practice on variations of the N-Back task to investigate the processes underlying possible expansion of the focus of attention within working memory. Using subtractive logic, we showed that random access (i.e.

Working memory at work: how the updating process alters the nature of working memory transfer.

In three N-Back experiments, we investigated components of the process of working memory (WM) updating, more specifically access to items stored outside the focus of attention and transfer from the focus to the region of WM outside the focus. We used stimulus complexity as a marker. We found that when WM transfer occurred under full attention, it was slow and highly sensitive to stimulus complexity, much more so than WM access.

A search-by-clusters model of visual search: fits to data from younger and older adults.

Objectives: This study aims to specify the processing operations underlying age-related differences in the speed and accuracy of visual search in a mathematical model.

Method: Eighteen older and 18 young adults searched for a predesignated target within 24-degree visual arrays containing distractors. Targets were systematically placed in regions that extended 2.

Ease of access to list items in short-term memory depends on the order of the recognition probes.

We report data from 4 experiments using a recognition design with multiple probes to be matched to specific study positions. Items could be accessed rapidly, independent of set size, when the test order matched the study order (forward condition). When the order of testing was random, backward, or in a prelearned irregular sequence (reordered conditions), the classic Sternberg result was obtained: Response times were slow and increased linearly with set size.