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A quasi-comprehensive exploration of the mechanisms of spatial working memory

Nature Human Behaviour volume 7, pages 729–739 (2023)Cite this article

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An Author Correction to this article was published on 19 May 2023

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Abstract

Why are some spatial patterns remembered more easily than others? There are many possible mechanisms underlying spatial working memory function. Here, the author explores different mechanisms simultaneously in a single conceptual model. He conducts a large-scale experiment (35.4 million responses used to measure human observers’ spatial working memory across 80,000 patterns) and builds a convolutional neural network as a benchmark for what is expected to be explainable. The author then creates a quasi-comprehensive exploration model of spatial working memory based on classic concepts, as well as new notions, including spatial uncertainty, Bayesian integration, out-of-range responses, averaging, grouping, categorical memory, line detection, gap detection, blurring, lateral inhibition, chunking, multiple spatial-frequency channels, redundancy, response bias and random guess. This model provides a tentative overarching framework for the mechanisms of spatial working memory.

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Fig. 1: Why are some spatial patterns remembered more easily?
Fig. 2: Patterns of the present study.
Fig. 3: Overview of methods and summary of results.
Fig. 4: A CNN network.
Fig. 5: Mechanisms of the QCE-SWM model (part one).
Fig. 6: Diagram of the QCE-SWM model.
Fig. 7: Mechanisms of the QCE-SWM model (part two).

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Data availability

All data can be found on the Open Science Framework https://osf.io/makdg/.

Code availability

All scripts used for data analysis can be found on the Open Science Framework https://osf.io/makdg/.

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Acknowledgements

The work described in this paper was supported by the Research Grants Council of Hong Kong (CUHK 14610520 awarded to L.H.). The funder had no role in study design, data collection and analysis, decision to publish or preparation of the manuscript. I am grateful to Entelligence (www.eletell.com) for integrating the present experiment into their mobile app ‘Light of the Future’ and to H. Xu for his valuable advice on neural networks.

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  1. Department of Psychology, The Chinese University of Hong Kong, Hong Kong, China

    Liqiang Huang

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  1. Liqiang Huang
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L.H. is the sole author of this article.

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Correspondence to Liqiang Huang.

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Nature Human Behaviour thanks Jordan Suchow and the other, anonymous, reviewer(s) for their contribution to the peer review of this work. Peer reviewer reports are available.

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Supplementary Sections 1–8, Figs. 1–5 and Tables 1 and 2.

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Huang, L. A quasi-comprehensive exploration of the mechanisms of spatial working memory. Nat Hum Behav 7, 729–739 (2023). https://doi.org/10.1038/s41562-023-01559-z

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