What are the benefits of directed attention within verbal working memory?

ABSTRACT: Information that is particularly relevant for upcoming behaviour can be prioritised within working memory, by directing attention to it. Receiving focused attention during retention is assumed to be associated with specific benefits, such as increased memory performance and reduced vulnerability to perceptual distractions. This has been demonstrated in visuospatial working memory. Given the domain-general nature of the focus of attention, these benefits should extend to verbal working memory as well. This was tested in the current study. In particular, we examined and compared the effects of cue-based and reward-based prioritisation in verbal working memory across a series of five preregistered experiments. These experiments varied in their memory materials, set size, interference, and mem

SUBMITTER: Jeanneret S 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC11783979 | biostudies-literature | 2025 Feb

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature