| Abstract: | Examined the influence of spatial attention on the retrieval of items from short term memory. 48 participants (aged 18–40 yrs) responded to probe letters after sets of 2, 4, and 6 letters were memorized (S. Sternberg, 1966, 1969). Spatial attention was controlled by central arrow cues and stimuli were presented in a clear or a visually degraded form. Overall RT was shorter for attended than for unattended locations, and shorter for clear than for degraded stimuli. Even though the function relating RT to memory-set size for stimuli in attended locations had a significantly smaller zero-intercept than the function for unattended locations, the slope was unchanged, which suggests that attention did not influence the memory-scanning stage. Visual quality interacted with attention, which suggests that they influenced the same stage of processing, presumably the early visual-encoding stage of processing. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved) |
