Event-related potential measures of visual working memory.

Full Abstract

Visual working memory is a limited capacity system that temporarily maintains information about objects in the immediate visual environment. Psychophysical experiments have shown that most people are able to actively maintain 3 or 4 items in visual working memory at any point in time. To better understand how this process works and why our working memory capacity is so limited, a variety of neurophysiological approaches have been employed. In recent years, there has been a surge of interest in understanding how visual information is maintained in working memory at the neural level. Single-cell research with nonhuman primates has shown that neuronal firing during the retention period reflects the information that is currently held in working memory. In humans, event-related potentials (ERPs) have been used to examine the maintenance of information in working memory. An event-related potential component, known as the negative slow wave (NSW), has been used to measure the maintenance of information in working memory "online" during a given trial. More recently, another ERP component, the contralateral delay activity (CDA) has been shown to be a fairly specific correlate of the current contents of working memory. This component is sensitive to an individual's working memory capacity and may provide a window into the operations of this central cognitive construct.

Learn Faster Today Improve your study skills

Author information

Author/s: Drew, Trafton W (TW); McCollough, Andrew W (AW); Vogel, Edward K (EK);

Affiliation: Department of Psychology, University of Oregon, Eugene 97403-1227, USA.

Journal and publication information

Publication Type: Journal Article; Research Support, N.I.H., Extramural; Research Support, Non-U.S. Gov't; Review

Journal: Clinical EEG and neuroscience : official journal of the EEG and Clinical Neuroscience Society (ENCS) (Clin EEG Neurosci), published in United States. (Language: eng)

Reference: 2006-Oct; vol 37 (issue 4) : pp 286-91

Dates: Created 2006/10/31; Completed 2006/12/07;

PMID: 17073166, status: MEDLINE (last retrieval date: 12/26/2008)

Sourced from the National Library of Medicine. Abstract text and other information may be subject to copyright.

External Links for this article (including full text providers, if available):

Click Electronic Full-text Provider Links to see options for finding the electronic full text links to this article. Note there may be a subscription or fee required for access to the full text. See our FAQ for information on finding FREE full text articles.

This article may also be located in paper journal collections available in many libraries. Use the Journal and Publication Information above to find the full article.

MeSH headings (categories)

This article was linked to the MESH Headings shown below.

Animals
Attention - physiology
Cerebral Cortex - physiology
Evoked Potentials, Visual - physiology

Humans
Magnetic Resonance Imaging
Memory, Short-Term - physiology
Visual Perception - physiology

These are the highest related articles currently in the database:

See 100+ related articles.