Task Termination Triggers Spontaneous Removal of Information From Visual Working Memory

Hiroyuki Tsubomi, Keisuke Fukuda, Atsushi Kikumoto, Ulrich Mayr, Edward K. Vogel

Psychological Science · 2024 · Volume 35 · Issue 9

Abstract

Working memory (WM) is a goal-directed memory system that actively maintains a limited amount of task-relevant information to serve the current goal. By this definition, WM maintenance should be terminated after the goal is accomplished, spontaneously removing no-longer-relevant information from WM. Past studies have failed to provide direct evidence of spontaneous removal of WM content by allowing participants to engage in a strategic reallocation of WM resources to competing information within WM. By contrast, we provide direct neural and behavioral evidence that visual WM content can be largely removed less than 1 s after it becomes obsolete, in the absence of a strategic allocation of resources (total N = 442 adults). These results demonstrate that visual WM is intrinsically a goal-directed system, and spontaneous removal provides a means for capacity-limited WM to keep up with ever-changing demands in a dynamic environment.

Keywords

working memory, delay activity, capacity limit, forgetting, open data, open materials

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