Visual working memory resource allocation mechanism in consolidation and maintenance phase

Abstract

Visual working memory (VWM) is a system for actively maintaining visual information to meet the needs of an ongoing task. It allows individuals to store visual input information from a complex outside environment and provides storage space as an information buffer platform to help integrate information into a continuous visual experience. This research examined the consolidation and maintenance phase of the VWM resource allocation mechanism. Four aspects of this issue were investigated. First, resource allocation in VWM consolidation was investigated for different materials, and it was determined whether VWM resources were allocated in a serial manner for orientation materials but in a limited-capacity parallel manner for colour materials. Second, voluntary resource allocation during the consolidation process was investigated and a two-phase model to explain resource allocation was proposed. In addition, the results suggested that the individual's VWM capacity has an impact on this two-phase process. Third, the effect of distribution location of memory items on VWM resource allocation was investigated, and it was found that more attention resources are available when items are spread across two hemifields. Fourth, the resource allocation in the maintenance phase was investigated, and it was found that participants could use dimension-based internal attention to reallocate resources to a particular dimension of representations. Overall, this research used the event-related potentials technique to solve the debate regarding the manner of VWM consolidation; proposed the two-phase model to explain the previous contradictory results regarding voluntary VWM resource allocation; explored the advantage of a bilateral field and developed a new paradigm to investigate dimension-based internal attention. Therefore, this research provided much new evidence and directions regarding resource allocation in the VWM consolidation and maintenance phase.