The development of visual short-term memory in infancy

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Event Abstract Back to Event Visual working memory in people with stuttering: ERP study Maria Pyasik1*, Stanislav Kozlovskiy1, Alexander Vartanov1 and Janna Glozman1 1 Lomonosov Moscow State University, Psychology, Russia Recent studies show, that working memory functioning is impaired in people with stuttering (Bajaj, 2007; Kaganovich et al. 2010). However, there is still no certain neurophysiological explanation of this fact. Participants in the study were 10 people with stuttering and 10 people without any speech impairments (8 men and 2 women in each subject group, mean age - 25,3±4,8 years old). We performed computer neuropsychological testing of visual working memory capacity. Subjects’ goal was to remember three simultaneously presented for 1000 ms visual stimuli and then find them in the same sequence among 16-20 similar stimuli after a 1200 ms delay. The test consisted of two series, which differed in stimuli type - complex geometric figures and words; the stimuli were based on A.R. Luria’s neuropsychological assessment materials. During the computer test event-related potentials were registered for the stimuli presentation. We compared the percentage of correct answers in the test between subject groups; event-related potentials were averaged for each part of the test and also compared between subject groups (the significance of the differences in ERP amplitudes was evaluated with Student’s t-test). According to the results of the test, visual working memory capacity in stuttering is significantly lower in comparison to the control subjects for memorizing complex geometric figures, while memorizing words did not reveal any significant differences. ERP amplitudes differ significantly between subject groups on the 400-600 ms interval post-stimulus for the ‘geometric figures’ part of the test; for the second part of the test there were no significant differences in ERP amplitudes. Furthermore, the coordinates of electrical activity dipole sources for 400-600 ms interval were calculated with BrainLoc 6.0 program (dipole coefficient > 0.95). For both parts of the test and both subject groups activation of orbitofrontal cortex and occipital lobe was revealed. However, the activation of orbitofrontal cortex in control subjects was stronger during more difficult part of the test than during the easier one, whereas in stuttering this activation was weaker (smaller amount of dipoles were revealed) regardless of the task difficulty. It can be speculated, that the resources of the central executive of working memory are limited in stuttering, which does not affect the performance in simple tasks but causes trouble during the difficult ones. Acknowledgements This study was supported by Russian Humanitarian Science Foundation (RHSF) project # 13-06-00570. Keywords: visual working memory, Stuttering, orbitofrontal cortex, Event-related potentials, source localization Conference: ACNS-2013 Australasian Cognitive Neuroscience Society Conference, Clayton, Melbourne, Australia, 28 Nov - 1 Dec, 2013. Presentation Type: Oral Topic: Memory Citation: Pyasik M, Kozlovskiy S, Vartanov A and Glozman J (2013). Visual working memory in people with stuttering: ERP study. Conference Abstract: ACNS-2013 Australasian Cognitive Neuroscience Society Conference. doi: 10.3389/conf.fnhum.2013.212.00174 Copyright: The abstracts in this collection have not been subject to any Frontiers peer review or checks, and are not endorsed by Frontiers. They are made available through the Frontiers publishing platform as a service to conference organizers and presenters. The copyright in the individual abstracts is owned by the author of each abstract or his/her employer unless otherwise stated. Each abstract, as well as the collection of abstracts, are published under a Creative Commons CC-BY 4.0 (attribution) licence (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/) and may thus be reproduced, translated, adapted and be the subject of derivative works provided the authors and Frontiers are attributed. For Frontiers’ terms and conditions please see https://www.frontiersin.org/legal/terms-and-conditions. Received: 15 Oct 2013; Published Online: 25 Nov 2013. * Correspondence: Ms. Maria Pyasik, Lomonosov Moscow State University, Psychology, Moscow, Russia, maria.pyasik@unito.it Login Required This action requires you to be registered with Frontiers and logged in. To register or login click here. Abstract Info Abstract The Authors in Frontiers Maria Pyasik Stanislav Kozlovskiy Alexander Vartanov Janna Glozman Google Maria Pyasik Stanislav Kozlovskiy Alexander Vartanov Janna Glozman Google Scholar Maria Pyasik Stanislav Kozlovskiy Alexander Vartanov Janna Glozman PubMed Maria Pyasik Stanislav Kozlovskiy Alexander Vartanov Janna Glozman Related Article in Frontiers Google Scholar PubMed Abstract Close Back to top Javascript is disabled. Please enable Javascript in your browser settings in order to see all the content on this page.

How do verbal descriptions affect visual memory over the short and long term? Here we show for the first time that verbal labeling can boost visual memories, but the source of this benefit depends on whether representations are maintained over the short term in visual working memory or over the long term in visual long-term memory. Across three experiments, we contrasted color memory of randomly colored objects when participants labeled (a) the color, (b) the object, or (c) the color-object binding, to memory under an articulatory suppression condition inhibiting labeling. Memory was tested at two time points: after three objects (visual working memory) and at the end of the experiment (visual long-term memory). In Experiment 1, color labeling improved, whereas object labeling impaired, visual working memory in comparison to suppression. Visual long-term memory remained unchanged across conditions. Experiment 2 tested whether this was attributable to poor overall long-term learning by repeating the colored objects over three successive working memory trials. This increased performance over the short and long term, yet labeling did not change learning rate over repetitions or delayed memory performance, showing no long-term memory benefit. In Experiment 3, a labeling benefit was observed when the color-object binding was labeled both over the short and long term. Mixture modeling indicated that color-labeling benefits in visual working memory resulted from an increase of detailed visual memory, whereas long-term memory benefits accrued from categorical representations. Our findings point to dissociations on the role of language in visual working memory and visual long-term memory. (PsycInfo Database Record (c) 2022 APA, all rights reserved).

Event Abstract Back to Event Variations in distinct white matter tract structures are linked to functional variations in language and attention across development Bruce D. McCandliss1* 1 Vanderbilt University, Department of Psychology, United States Specific relationships exist between structural variations in white matter tract anatomy (as measured by DTI) and functional variations in language and executive attention. Drawing on research spanning from late childhood through adulthood, this talk reviews individual differences in specific regions of white matter anatomical microstructure and links these to variation in functional efficiency across a number of computationally distinct cognitive operations. This is first shown within samples of typically developing children and adults, then in special populations that exhibit deficits in white matter and functional deficits in specific cognitive processes. The resulting structure-function relationships are both regionally specific in their anatomical location and functionally specific in terms of cognitive processes. For example, within the domain of attention, individual differences in separate white matter tracts are linked to performance measures of alerting, orienting, cognitive conflict. Similar structure-function dissociations occur across specific components of memory systems, and across specific components of language processing. These structure-function relationships are paralleled in studies of more extreme functional and structural variation that characterize children with developmental language and attention disabilities, as well as adult studies of cognitive disruptions associated with mild traumatic brain injury. A dimensional framework is presented that argues that the same principled relationships between brain structures and functions may explain specific symptoms of developmental disabilities as well as typical variation in cognitive processes. Conference: Conference on Neurocognitive Development, Berkeley, CA, United States, 12 Jul - 14 Jul, 2009. Presentation Type: Oral Presentation Topic: Language Citation: McCandliss BD (2009). Variations in distinct white matter tract structures are linked to functional variations in language and attention across development. Conference Abstract: Conference on Neurocognitive Development. doi: 10.3389/conf.neuro.09.2009.10.008 Copyright: The abstracts in this collection have not been subject to any Frontiers peer review or checks, and are not endorsed by Frontiers. They are made available through the Frontiers publishing platform as a service to conference organizers and presenters. The copyright in the individual abstracts is owned by the author of each abstract or his/her employer unless otherwise stated. Each abstract, as well as the collection of abstracts, are published under a Creative Commons CC-BY 4.0 (attribution) licence (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/) and may thus be reproduced, translated, adapted and be the subject of derivative works provided the authors and Frontiers are attributed. For Frontiers’ terms and conditions please see https://www.frontiersin.org/legal/terms-and-conditions. Received: 06 Jul 2009; Published Online: 06 Jul 2009. * Correspondence: Bruce D McCandliss, Vanderbilt University, Department of Psychology, Nashville, United States, brucemc@stanford.edu Login Required This action requires you to be registered with Frontiers and logged in. To register or login click here. Abstract Info Abstract The Authors in Frontiers Bruce D McCandliss Google Bruce D McCandliss Google Scholar Bruce D McCandliss PubMed Bruce D McCandliss Related Article in Frontiers Google Scholar PubMed Abstract Close Back to top Javascript is disabled. Please enable Javascript in your browser settings in order to see all the content on this page.

Cochlear implantation is a well-established method for restoring hearing sensation in individuals with severe to profound hearing loss. It significantly improves verbal communication for many users, despite substantial variability in patients' reports and performance on speech perception tests and quality-of-life outcome measures. Such variability in outcome measures remains several years after implantation and could reflect difficulties in attentional regulation. The current study assessed the ability to use a cue to guide attention internally toward visual or auditory working memory (i.e., reflective attention) in cochlear implant (CI) users. Participants completed a cognitive task called the delayed match-to-sample task in which a visual gradient was presented on a computer screen and a piano tone was presented through speakers simultaneously. A visual cue (i.e., letter A or V) instructed participants to focus attention on the item held in auditory or visual working memory. After a delay following the cue presentation, participants were presented with a probe item and indicated by pressing a button whether it matched the cued item in working memory. CI users and age-matched normal hearing adults showed comparable benefit from having an informative cue relative to an uninformative cue (i.e., letter X). Although CI users have had a history of severe deafness and experience coarse sound information, they were able to retrospectively orient their attention to an item in auditory or visual working memory. These findings suggest that CI users with at least one year of CI experience can successfully regulate attention to a level that is comparable to that of normal hearing individuals.

Visual short-term memory (VSTM) is a capacity limited resource, which is consistently estimated to hold about four visual items at a time. There is, however, debate in the literature about what constitutes an "item" and how resources are allocated within VSTM. Some research suggests information is stored in VSTM as discrete objects; however, there is also evidence suggesting that within-object features alter VSTM performance. The present study addresses the question of whether VSTM load effects reflect the number of discrete objects and/or the number of within-object features. An electrophysiological correlate of VSTM--the contralateral delay activity (CDA)--was measured while participants performed a lateralized change-detection task, in which to-be-remembered items varied in the number of features and locations. Each trial contained either a solitary simple feature (shape, color, or orientation) or one of two multifeature arrays: three features presented at three separate locations or three features bound at one location. While presenting multiple features--regardless of whether they are at discrete locations or bound within a single object--resulted in greater CDA amplitude relative to a solitary feature, there was a dissociation in the distribution of activity between the two multifeature conditions, such that the CDA at site P1/P2 was sensitive to the number of discrete objects, while activity at P7/P8 was most enhanced when multiple features were bound in one object. The findings demonstrate the inhomogeneity of the CDA and suggest this electrophysiological marker may reflect both discrete object individuation/separation and flexible feature-feature binding in VSTM.

PsychophysiologyVolume 57, Issue 9 e13659 EDITORIAL Resources to assist EEG/ERP researchers during the COVID-19 pandemic Steven J. Luck, Corresponding Author Steven J. Luck [email protected] orcid.org/0000-0002-3725-1474 Center for Mind & Brain and Department of Psychology, University of California, Davis, CA, USA Correspondence Steven J. Luck, Center for Mind & Brain and Department of Psychology, University of California, 267 Cousteau Place, Davis, CA 95618, USA. Email: [email protected]Search for more papers by this authorEmily S. Kappenman, Emily S. Kappenman orcid.org/0000-0002-2789-015X Department of Psychology, San Diego State University, San Diego, CA, USASearch for more papers by this author Steven J. Luck, Corresponding Author Steven J. Luck [email protected] orcid.org/0000-0002-3725-1474 Center for Mind & Brain and Department of Psychology, University of California, Davis, CA, USA Correspondence Steven J. Luck, Center for Mind & Brain and Department of Psychology, University of California, 267 Cousteau Place, Davis, CA 95618, USA. Email: [email protected]Search for more papers by this authorEmily S. Kappenman, Emily S. Kappenman orcid.org/0000-0002-2789-015X Department of Psychology, San Diego State University, San Diego, CA, USASearch for more papers by this author First published: 04 August 2020 https://doi.org/10.1111/psyp.13659Citations: 1Read the full textAboutPDF ToolsRequest permissionExport citationAdd to favoritesTrack citation ShareShare Give accessShare full text accessShare full-text accessPlease review our Terms and Conditions of Use and check box below to share full-text version of article.I have read and accept the Wiley Online Library Terms and Conditions of UseShareable LinkUse the link below to share a full-text version of this article with your friends and colleagues. Learn more.Copy URL Share a linkShare onEmailFacebookxLinkedInRedditWechat No abstract is available for this article. REFERENCES Bikson, M., Hanlon, C. A., Woods, A. J., Gillick, B. T., Charvet, L., Lamm, C., … Ekhtiari, H. (2020). Guidelines for TMS/tES clinical services and research through the COVID-19 pandemic. Brain Stimulation, 13, 1124–1149. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.brs.2020.05.010 10.1016/j.brs.2020.05.010 PubMedWeb of Science®Google Scholar Desai, U., Kassardjian, C. D., Toro, D. D., Gleveckas-Martens, N., Srinivasan, J., Venesy, D., & Narayanaswami, P. (2020). Guidance for resumption of routine electrodiagnostic testing during the COVID-19 pandemic. American Association of Neuromuscular & Electrodiagnostic Medicine. Retrieved from https://www.aanem.org/getmedia/569acf3b-98b6-4452-a251-03f8cd4e0c6d/AANEM-COVID-19-Safe-Re-entry-Guidance_3.pdf 10.1002/mus.26990 Google Scholar Farrens, J. L., Simmons, A. M., Luck, S. J., & Kappenman, E. S. (2019). Electroencephalogram (EEG) recording protocol for cognitive and affective human neuroscience research. Protocol Exchange. https://doi.org/10.21203/rs.2.18328/v2 Google Scholar Kappenman, E. S., Farrens, J. L., Zhang, W., Stewart, A. X., & Luck, S. J. (2020, May 22). ERP CORE: An open resource for human event-related potential research [Preprint]. PsyArXiv. https://doi.org/10.31234/osf.io/4azqm Google Scholar Lopez-Calderon, J., & Luck, S. J. (2014). ERPLAB: An open-source toolbox for the analysis of event-related potentials. Frontiers in Human Neuroscience, 8, 213. https://doi.org/10.3389/fnhum.2014.00213 10.3389/fnhum.2014.00213 PubMedWeb of Science®Google Scholar San-Juan, D., Jiménez, C. R., Camilli, C. X., de la Cruz Reyes, L. A., Galindo, E. G. A., Burbano, G. E. R., … Kimaid, P. A. T. (2020). Guidance for clinical neurophysiology examination throughout the COVID-19 pandemic. Latin American chapter of the IFCN task force—COVID-19. Clinical Neurophysiology, 131(7), 1589–1598. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.clinph.2020.04.011 10.1016/j.clinph.2020.04.011 PubMedWeb of Science®Google Scholar Simmons, A. M., & Luck, S. J. (2020). Protocol for reducing COVID-19 transmission risk in EEG research. Protocol Exchange. https://doi.org/10.21203/rs.3.pex-974/v1 Google Scholar Citing Literature Volume57, Issue9September 2020e13659 ReferencesRelatedInformation

Manipulations of attention dissociate fragile visual short-term memory from visual working memory

Visual short-term memory (VSTM) provides an on-line mental space for incoming sensory information to be temporally maintained to carry out complex behavioral tasks. Despite its essential functions, the capacity at which VSTM could maintain sensory information is limited (i.e., VSTM can hold only about three to four visual items at once). Moreover, the quality of sensory representation (i.e., precision) degrades as more information has to be maintained in VSTM. Correlational evidence suggests that the level and the pattern of neural activity measured in the posterior parietal cortex (PPC) track both VSTM capacity and precision. However, the causal contributions of the PPC to these different VSTM operations are unclear. Here, we tested whether stimulating the PPC with transcranial direct current stimulation (tDCS) could increase VSTM capacity or precision. We found that stimulating the PPC in male and female human participants selectively enhanced VSTM capacity when the number of memory items exceeded capacity limit, without significant effects on VSTM precision. Moreover, this enhancement of VSTM capacity is region specific as stimulating the prefrontal cortex did not change VSTM capacity or precision. Null stimulation effects in the sensory memory condition confirmed that the tDCS-induced enhancement of VSTM capacity was not simply due to changes in sensory or attentional processes. Altogether, these results provide causal evidence suggesting that the PPC has a more dominant role in supporting the storage capacity of VSTM compared with maintaining the quality of sensory representations. Furthermore, tDCS could be used as a promising noninvasive method to enhance this PPC VSTM-related function.SIGNIFICANCE STATEMENT Correlational evidence from neuroimaging and electrophysiology suggests that the posterior parietal cortex (PPC) supports the storage capacity of visual short-term memory (VSTM) and the precision of sensory representations maintained in VSTM. However, the causal contributions of the PPC to these different VSTM functions were unclear. Here, we found that electrical stimulation over the PPC selectively enhanced VSTM capacity without changing VSTM precision. Overall, our findings suggest that the PPC has a dominant and causal role in supporting the storage capacity of VSTM.

BACKGROUND: Ischemic hypoxia induced by suprathreshold G-force loading can adversely affect vision, cognition, and lead to loss of consciousness (LOC). The purpose of this study was to determine whether reductions in cerebral oxygenation, caused by subthreshold G-forces (up to 4 Gz and of limited durations that do not lead to LOC), would affect visual perception and working memory performance.METHODS: Sixteen subjects performed visual perception and working memory tasks both before and during Gz exposures (1, 2.2, 3, 4 with leg pressurization, 4 with leg and abdomen pressurization) within a human-use centrifuge.RESULTS: As measured using near-infrared spectroscopy, blood oxygenation over medial prefrontal cortex was similar in the 1 and 2.2 Gz conditions, but was reduced to a similar extent in the 3 and 4 Gz conditions. In parallel, visual perception accuracy was reduced in the 3 and 4 Gz conditions, with no difference between the 3 and 4 Gz conditions. No change in reaction time was seen. Conversely, neither accuracy nor reaction time changes were observed for the visual working memory task.DISCUSSION: These results indicate that although visual working memory is not affected, the ability to visually discriminate between stimuli is reduced at G-forces as low as 3 and 4 Gz. This may have important ramifications for pilots who are routinely subjected to such forces.Croft RJ, Klegrd R, Tribukait A, Taylor NAS, Eiken O. Effects of acceleration-induced reductions in retinal and cerebral oxygenation on human performance. Aerosp Med Hum Perform. 2021; 92(2):7582.

SUMMARYNeuronal oscillations are suggested to play an important role in auditory working memory (WM), but their contribution to content-specific representations has remained unclear. Here, we measure magnetoencephalography during a retro-cueing task with parametric ripple-sound stimuli, which are spectrotemporally similar to speech but resist non-auditory memory strategies. Using machine learning analyses, with rigorous between-subject cross-validation and non-parametric permutation testing, we show that memorized sound content is strongly represented in phase-synchronization patterns between subregions of auditory and frontoparietal cortices. These phase-synchronization patterns predict the memorized sound content steadily across the studied maintenance period. In addition to connectivity-based representations, there are indices of more local, “activity silent” representations in auditory cortices, where the decoding accuracy of WM content significantly increases after task-irrelevant “impulse stimuli.” Our results demonstrate that synchronization patterns across auditory sensory and association areas orchestrate neuronal coding of auditory WM content. This connectivity-based coding scheme could also extend beyond the auditory domain.

It is a fundamental question that whether visual short-term memory(VSTM) and visual long-term memory(VLTM) are two separate stores or two different states of the same representation. Previous researches focused on whether VSTM could be facilitated by VLTM, however, existing studies on this topic yielded conflicting results. Most neurophysiological or behavioral studies adopted faces as stimuli, and have arrived at the conclusion that VLTM could facilitate VSTM. It ought to be noted that in studies that found no facilitation, the exposure of the experimental materials was not sufficiently to activate VLTM. Therefore, it was hypothesized that only a highly activated VLTM could facilitate VSTM.The purpose of the present study was to investigate the effect of activation level of VLTM on facilitating VSTM within the change-detection paradigm. In Experiment 1, participants were instructed to memorize a study image including 6 geometric figures(6 random shape-color bindings from a pool of eight shapes and eight colors), and then after a random inter-stimulus interval(1, 1.5, or 3 s), either the same image or an image with one shape or color changed was presented, and participants were asked to judge whether they detected a change. In Experiment 2, a total of 8 geometric figures with fixed combinations of color and shape were used to substitute all the random combinations of experiment 1. The experimental procedure and design was identical to experiment 1. One hour after the experiment, participants were asked to participate in a post-experiment to examine whether the study stimuli were stored in VLTM. In Experiment 3, participants were asked to visually study the 8 figures in experiment 2 for a week(at least 10 min a day). Then, they took part in a pre-experiment(the same as the post-experiment in experiment 2) to test whether a highly activated VLTM was obtained. At last, the experimental procedure as described in Experiment 2 was performed. The results showed that although VLTM was formed in experiment 2, there was no significant increase in d' or K value of VSTM, indicating no facilitation of VLTM in this case. However, in experiment 3, VLTM was highly activated, and a better performance was observed as compared with experiment 1 and 2. In addition, the effect size of ISI decreased as the activation level of VLTM increased from experiment 1 to experiment 3. The results suggest that whether VLTM can facilitate VSTM is mainly depend on the activation level of VLTM, only a highly activated VLTM can facilitate VSTM, and can inhibit the rapid fading of VSTM traces. On this basis, we conclude that VSTM and VLTM are more likely to be two states of the same representation.

In this study, we investigated whether the ability to learn probability information is affected by the type of representation held in visual working memory. Across 4 experiments, participants detected changes to displays of coloured shapes. While participants detected changes in 1 dimension (e.g., colour), a feature from a second, nonchanging dimension (e.g., shape) predicted which object was most likely to change. In Experiments 1 and 3, items could be grouped by similarity in the changing dimension across items (e.g., colours and shapes were repeated in the display), while in Experiments 2 and 4 items could not be grouped by similarity (all features were unique). Probability information from the predictive dimension was learned and used to increase performance, but only when all of the features within a display were unique (Experiments 2 and 4). When it was possible to group by feature similarity in the changing dimension (e.g., 2 blue objects appeared within an array), participants were unable to learn probability information and use it to improve performance (Experiments 1 and 3). The results suggest that probability information can be learned in a dimension that is not explicitly task-relevant, but only when the probability information is represented with the changing dimension in visual working memory.

It is unclear to what extent sensory processing areas are involved in the maintenance of sensory information in working memory (WM). Previous studies have thus far relied on finding neural activity in the corresponding sensory cortices, neglecting potential activity-silent mechanisms, such as connectivity-dependent encoding. It has recently been found that visual stimulation during visual WM maintenance reveals WM-dependent changes through a bottom-up neural response. Here, we test whether this impulse response is uniquely visual and sensory-specific. Human participants (both sexes) completed visual and auditory WM tasks while electroencephalography was recorded. During the maintenance period, the WM network was perturbed serially with fixed and task-neutral auditory and visual stimuli. We show that a neutral auditory impulse-stimulus presented during the maintenance of a pure tone resulted in a WM-dependent neural response, providing evidence for the auditory counterpart to the visual WM findings reported previously. Interestingly, visual stimulation also resulted in an auditory WM-dependent impulse response, implicating the visual cortex in the maintenance of auditory information, either directly or indirectly, as a pathway to the neural auditory WM representations elsewhere. In contrast, during visual WM maintenance, only the impulse response to visual stimulation was content-specific, suggesting that visual information is maintained in a sensory-specific neural network, separated from auditory processing areas.SIGNIFICANCE STATEMENT Working memory is a crucial component of intelligent, adaptive behavior. Our understanding of the neural mechanisms that support it has recently shifted: rather than being dependent on an unbroken chain of neural activity, working memory may rely on transient changes in neuronal connectivity, which can be maintained efficiently in activity-silent brain states. Previous work using a visual impulse stimulus to perturb the memory network has implicated such silent states in the retention of line orientations in visual working memory. Here, we show that auditory working memory similarly retains auditory information. We also observed a sensory-specific impulse response in visual working memory, while auditory memory responded bimodally to both visual and auditory impulses, possibly reflecting visual dominance of working memory.

Event Abstract Back to Event Distributed and overlapping neural bases for object individuation and identification Claire Naughtin1*, Paul Dux1 and Jason Mattingley1 1 The University of Queensland, School of Psychology, Australia To gain a sense of what, where and when visual information appears in our environment, we rely on two key processes known as object individuation and identification. In object individuation, spatial and temporal cues are used to register an object as a distinct perceptual event relative to other objects. In object identification, featural and related conceptual properties of a stimulus are extracted. It is currently unclear how these two processes are represented in the brain. We explored whether individuation and identification processes are underpinned by distinct neural substrates, and the extent to which brain regions involved in these two operations are consistent across encoding, maintenance and retrieval stages of visual short-term memory. Using functional magnetic resonance imaging we tested for brain regions that were sensitive to the number of physical objects (individuation) or the number of distinct object identities (identification) presented in a display. Across both univariate and multi-voxel pattern analyses, we found a large degree of overlap between these two processes in the brain. In addition, the brain regions recruited for each process varied across each stage of visual short-term memory. Our findings challenge influential models of multiple object encoding in VSTM which argue that individuation and identification are underpinned by a limited set of non-overlapping brain regions. Keywords: fMRI, visual short-term memory, multi-voxel pattern analysis, object identification, object individuation Conference: XII International Conference on Cognitive Neuroscience (ICON-XII), Brisbane, Queensland, Australia, 27 Jul - 31 Jul, 2014. Presentation Type: Poster Topic: Cognition and Executive Processes Citation: Naughtin C, Dux P and Mattingley J (2015). Distributed and overlapping neural bases for object individuation and identification. Conference Abstract: XII International Conference on Cognitive Neuroscience (ICON-XII). doi: 10.3389/conf.fnhum.2015.217.00231 Copyright: The abstracts in this collection have not been subject to any Frontiers peer review or checks, and are not endorsed by Frontiers. They are made available through the Frontiers publishing platform as a service to conference organizers and presenters. The copyright in the individual abstracts is owned by the author of each abstract or his/her employer unless otherwise stated. Each abstract, as well as the collection of abstracts, are published under a Creative Commons CC-BY 4.0 (attribution) licence (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/) and may thus be reproduced, translated, adapted and be the subject of derivative works provided the authors and Frontiers are attributed. For Frontiers’ terms and conditions please see https://www.frontiersin.org/legal/terms-and-conditions. Received: 19 Feb 2015; Published Online: 24 Apr 2015. * Correspondence: Miss. Claire Naughtin, The University of Queensland, School of Psychology, Brisbane, Australia, claire.naughtin@gmail.com Login Required This action requires you to be registered with Frontiers and logged in. To register or login click here. Abstract Info Abstract The Authors in Frontiers Claire Naughtin Paul Dux Jason Mattingley Google Claire Naughtin Paul Dux Jason Mattingley Google Scholar Claire Naughtin Paul Dux Jason Mattingley PubMed Claire Naughtin Paul Dux Jason Mattingley Related Article in Frontiers Google Scholar PubMed Abstract Close Back to top Javascript is disabled. Please enable Javascript in your browser settings in order to see all the content on this page.