台大心理系

Working memory (WM) retains past sensory information for a short time period and prepares it for future use. Given its limited capacity, attention plays a crucial role in selecting and prioritizing relevant information for maintenance. In turn, WM guides attention to support upcoming tasks and actions. In this talk, I will present recent research from my lab examining the interaction between WM and attention. Using EEG, MEG, and fMRI, we investigate the neural mechanisms underlying the orienting of attention to and from WM contents and how these processes shape human behaviour. First, I will discuss factors that influence WM maintenance and demonstrate how electrophysiological activity during retention reflects content-specific WM capacity. Second, I will introduce the concept of internal attention in WM and explore the mechanisms that support effective maintenance and preparation for delayed responses. Finally, I will discuss how WM templates guide object selectivity, using a MEG-fMRI fusion approach to uncover the spatiotemporal neural dynamics underlying top-down modulation of category-specific information. Together, these studies provide novel insights into the content-dependent, goal-directed, and anticipatory mechanisms by which WM and attention jointly guide behaviour.