Working Memory and Consciousness: The Current State of Play
Marjan Persuh, Eric LaRock, Jacob Berger
Frontiers in Human Neuroscience March 2, 2018 DOI: 10.3389/fnhum.2018.00078 (opens in new tab)
Study at a glance
AI-extracted from the abstract| Characteristics | Review Peer reviewed |
|---|---|
| Citations | 75 |
| Key findings | Argues that current evidence does not support an unconscious visual working memory store, though the authors offer independent reasons to think working memory may operate on unconsciously perceived information. |
Abstract
Working memory (WM), an important posit in cognitive science, allows one to temporarily store and manipulate information in the service of ongoing tasks. WM has been traditionally classified as an explicit memory system-that is, as operating on and maintaining only consciously perceived information. Recently, however, several studies have questioned this assumption, purporting to provide evidence for unconscious WM. In this article, we focus on visual working memory (VWM) and critically examine these studies as well as studies of unconscious perception that seem to provide indirect evidence for unconscious WM. Our analysis indicates that current evidence does not support an unconscious WM store, though we offer independent reasons to think that WM may operate on unconsciously perceived information.
Citations in the library
Cited by 16
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- The attentional blink unveils the interplay between conscious perception, spatial attention and working memory encoding. Consciousness and Cognition October 1, 2020
- Imagination, endogenous attention, and mental agency Phenomenology and the Cognitive Sciences April 21, 2023
- Replicating the unconscious working memory effect: a multisite Registered Report. Neuroscience of Consciousness 2026
- Reassessing Information in Understanding the Temporality of Consciousness Preprints.org June 5, 2024
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Cites 17
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- Dissociating Perceptual Confidence from Discrimination Accuracy Reveals No Influence of Metacognitive Awareness on Working Memory Frontiers in Psychology June 5, 2016
- The neural correlates of dreaming. Nature Neuroscience April 10, 2017
- Conscious and unconscious performance monitoring: Evidence from patients with schizophrenia. Neuroimage 2017
- Brain Mechanisms Underlying the Brief Maintenance of Seen and Unseen Sensory Information. Neuron December 7, 2016
and 12 more in the library