Most daily tasks require frequent information exchange between working memory (WM) and long-term memory (LTM). However, the factors that modulate the reactivation of LTMs in WM remain to be explored. Here, we tested the effects of anticipated perceptual interference on reactivation using contralateral delay activity (CDA) in the EEG. On each trial, participants saw a previously studied object that was tested after a brief retention interval. In half of the blocks, the retention contained perceptual distractors. Half of the participants had larger CDA on interference blocks (WM preparers) and others on no interference blocks (LTM preparers). WM preparers showed smaller interference costs in accuracy suggesting that preparing against interference via reactivating LTMs in WM is a more effective strategy than relying on passive LTMs. Moreover, in interference blocks, contralateral alpha suppression, an index of spatial attention, disappeared during retention in anticipation of interference, mostly in WM preparers. These results indicate that individuals stopped attending to reactivated memories when anticipating interference, presumably to prevent the involuntary encoding of perceptual distractors that appear at attended locations. Together, these results highlight individual differences in preparing for anticipated interference in recruiting WM to store LTMs, and their effects on proneness to interference.
We perceive the world in a continuum but remember our past as discrete episodic events. Dominant models of event segmentation suggest that prediction errors or contextual changes are the driving factors that parse continuous experiences into segmented events. These models propose working memory to hold a critical role in event segmentation, yet the particular functioning of working memory that underlies segmented episodic memories remains unclear. Here, we first review the literature regarding the factors that result in the segmentation of episodic memories. Next, we discuss the role of working memory under two possible models regarding how it represents information within each event. Lastly, we summarize the role of the hippocampus in segmenting and integrating events. Clarifying the contributions of working memory to event segmentation is important to improve our understanding of the structure of episodic memories.
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