TY - JOUR
T1 - Working memory accuracy for multiple targets is driven by reward expectation and stimulus contrast with different time-courses
AU - Klink, P. Christiaan
AU - Jeurissen, Danique
AU - Theeuwes, Jan
AU - Denys, Damiaan
AU - Roelfsema, Pieter R.
N1 - Publisher Copyright:
© 2017 The Author(s).
PY - 2017/12/1
Y1 - 2017/12/1
N2 - The richness of sensory input dictates that the brain must prioritize and select information for further processing and storage in working memory. Stimulus salience and reward expectations influence this prioritization but their relative contributions and underlying mechanisms are poorly understood. Here we investigate how the quality of working memory for multiple stimuli is determined by priority during encoding and later memory phases. Selective attention could, for instance, act as the primary gating mechanism when stimuli are still visible. Alternatively, observers might still be able to shift priorities across memories during maintenance or retrieval. To distinguish between these possibilities, we investigated how and when reward cues determine working memory accuracy and found that they were only effective during memory encoding. Previously learned, but currently non-predictive, color-reward associations had a similar influence, which gradually weakened without reinforcement. Finally, we show that bottom-up salience, manipulated through varying stimulus contrast, influences memory accuracy during encoding with a fundamentally different time-course than top-down reward cues. While reward-based effects required long stimulus presentation, the influence of contrast was strongest with brief presentations. Our results demonstrate how memory resources are distributed over memory targets and implicates selective attention as a main gating mechanism between sensory and memory systems.
AB - The richness of sensory input dictates that the brain must prioritize and select information for further processing and storage in working memory. Stimulus salience and reward expectations influence this prioritization but their relative contributions and underlying mechanisms are poorly understood. Here we investigate how the quality of working memory for multiple stimuli is determined by priority during encoding and later memory phases. Selective attention could, for instance, act as the primary gating mechanism when stimuli are still visible. Alternatively, observers might still be able to shift priorities across memories during maintenance or retrieval. To distinguish between these possibilities, we investigated how and when reward cues determine working memory accuracy and found that they were only effective during memory encoding. Previously learned, but currently non-predictive, color-reward associations had a similar influence, which gradually weakened without reinforcement. Finally, we show that bottom-up salience, manipulated through varying stimulus contrast, influences memory accuracy during encoding with a fundamentally different time-course than top-down reward cues. While reward-based effects required long stimulus presentation, the influence of contrast was strongest with brief presentations. Our results demonstrate how memory resources are distributed over memory targets and implicates selective attention as a main gating mechanism between sensory and memory systems.
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U2 - 10.1038/s41598-017-08608-4
DO - 10.1038/s41598-017-08608-4
M3 - Article
C2 - 28831072
AN - SCOPUS:85028077922
SN - 2045-2322
VL - 7
JO - Scientific reports
JF - Scientific reports
IS - 1
M1 - 9082
ER -