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| Author(s): |
Luísa Superbia Guimarães
Total Authors: 1
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| Document type: | Master's Dissertation |
| Press: | Ribeirão Preto. |
| Institution: | Universidade de São Paulo (USP). Faculdade de Filosofia, Ciências e Letras de Ribeirão Preto (PCARP/BC) |
| Defense date: | 2019-02-21 |
| Examining board members: |
Cesar Alexis Galera;
Hugo Cézar Palhares Ferreira;
Sergio Sheiji Fukusima;
Rui de Moraes Júnior
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| Advisor: | Cesar Alexis Galera |
| Abstract | |
Providing cues during the maintenance period of working memory tasks improves participants\' performance in terms of accuracy and response times (RT). This phenomenon is known as the retro-cue effect. We performed three experiments to test the assumption that the retro-cue effect relies on an imagetic representation of the stimuli, available to conscious inspection at the moment of the cue\'s onset. In Experiment 1, we manipulated the number of stimuli (set size 2 and 3) and inserted a visual search task during the retention interval to prevent visual rehearsal. We applied the Sternberg\'s additive factors method to measure the time participants spent to reactivate the items under the form of mental images. The intercept of the linear function between RT and set size increased 400 ms in the presence of the visual search. In Experiment 2, we added 500 ms of blank screen after the visual search task and immediately before the cue\'s onset, so that participants could use this interval to reactivate the items as mental images. The retro-cue effect occurred both for the RT and the discrimination index (d\'). In Experiment 3, we manipulated the type of the concurrent task during the retention interval: visual search, tone monitoring, and color discrimination. The visual search was the most deleterious task for the participants\' performance and for the retro-cue effect, followed by the color discrimination. The combination of attentional demand and visual processing in the visual search was particularly deleterious to performance. We concluded that the functioning of retro-cues is modulated by those two factors, and not only by central attentional resources. The results support a working memory model that considers the phenomenon of mental imagery in its architecture (AU) | |
| FAPESP's process: | 17/23217-6 - The role of attention and visual processing in the retrocue effect |
| Grantee: | Luísa Superbia Guimarães |
| Support Opportunities: | Scholarships in Brazil - Master |