Schedule of Events | Symposia

Attentional Breadth Modulates Trade-offs in Memory Precision

Poster Session C - Sunday, March 30, 2025, 5:00 – 7:00 pm EDT, Back Bay Ballroom/Republic Ballroom

Hannah Tarder-Stoll¹ (htarder-stoll@research.baycrest.org), Asaf Gilboa¹, Morris Moscovitch¹; ¹Rotman Research Institute, Baycrest Hospital

Attention strongly influences what we remember. The breadth of attention–focusing on either a broad or narrow area of the environment—can fluctuate depending on behavioural goals. However, little is known about the consequences of such attentional fluctuations for memory. We hypothesized that the extent of attentional breadth would influence memory precision, such that broader attentional states at encoding would lead to less precise memories. Participants (N = 64) were cued to attend to narrow or broad sections on a screen. They then encoded objects and their spatial locations while making judgements about the object’s location, relative to the cue. After, participants completed two memory tests: a location memory test and an object memory test. Location memories were less precise and more dispersed when they were encoded in a broad attentional state, compared to a narrow state. In contrast, object memories were more precise in the broad vs. narrow attentional state. This object memory enhancement may reflect increased incidental encoding of information not relevant to the behavioral task at encoding, which emphasized spatial location. Together, these findings suggest that broader attentional states reduce the precision of task-relevant memories but enhance encoding of peripheral, task-irrelevant details. These findings provide insight into the nuanced relationship between states of attentional breadth and their consequences for memory precision, depending on the relevance of the encoded information to behavioral goals.

Topic Area: LONG-TERM MEMORY: Episodic