Cross-Modal Decoding of Neural Patterns Associated with Working Memory: Evidence for Attention-Based Accounts of Working Memory.
Cereb Cortex
; 26(1): 166-79, 2016 Jan.
Article
in En
| MEDLINE
| ID: mdl-25146374
ABSTRACT
Recent studies suggest common neural substrates involved in verbal and visual working memory (WM), interpreted as reflecting shared attention-based, short-term retention mechanisms. We used a machine-learning approach to determine more directly the extent to which common neural patterns characterize retention in verbal WM and visual WM. Verbal WM was assessed via a standard delayed probe recognition task for letter sequences of variable length. Visual WM was assessed via a visual array WM task involving the maintenance of variable amounts of visual information in the focus of attention. We trained a classifier to distinguish neural activation patterns associated with high- and low-visual WM load and tested the ability of this classifier to predict verbal WM load (high-low) from their associated neural activation patterns, and vice versa. We observed significant between-task prediction of load effects during WM maintenance, in posterior parietal and superior frontal regions of the dorsal attention network; in contrast, between-task prediction in sensory processing cortices was restricted to the encoding stage. Furthermore, between-task prediction of load effects was strongest in those participants presenting the highest capacity for the visual WM task. This study provides novel evidence for common, attention-based neural patterns supporting verbal and visual WM.
Key words
Full text:
1
Database:
MEDLINE
Main subject:
Psychomotor Performance
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Attention
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Verbal Learning
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Visual Perception
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Cognition
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Memory, Short-Term
Type of study:
Prognostic_studies
/
Risk_factors_studies
Limits:
Adolescent
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Adult
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Female
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Humans
/
Male
Language:
En
Year:
2016
Type:
Article