Crows control working memory before and after stimulus encoding.

ABSTRACT: The capacity of working memory is limited and this limit is comparable in crows and primates. To maximize this resource, humans use attention to select only relevant information for maintenance. Interestingly, attention-cues are effective not only before but also after the presentation of to-be-remembered stimuli, highlighting control mechanisms beyond sensory selection. Here we explore if crows are also capable of these forms of control over working memory. Two crows (Corvus corone) were trained to memorize two, four or six visual stimuli. Comparable to our previous results, the crows showed a decrease in performance with increasing working memory load. Using attention cues, we indicated the critical stimulus on a given trial. These cues were either presented before (pre-cue) or after sam

SUBMITTER: Fongaro E 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC7039964 | biostudies-literature | 2020 Feb

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature