title: Visual memory decay is deterministic.
abstract: After observers see an object or pattern, their visual memory of what they have seen decays slowly over time. Nearly all current theories of vision assume that decay of short-term memory occurs because visual representations are progressively and randomly corrupted as time passes. We tested this assumption using psychophysical noise-masking methods, and we found that visual memory decays in a completely deterministic fashion. This surprising finding challenges current ideas about visual memory and sets a goal for future memory research: to characterize the deterministic "forgetting function" that describes how memories decay over time.
authors.affiliation: Department of Psychology, Indiana University, IN 47405, USA. jgold@indiana.edu
authors.forename: Jason M
authors.initials: JM
authors.lastname: Gold
authors.forename: Richard F
authors.initials: RF
authors.lastname: Murray
authors.forename: Allison B
authors.initials: AB
authors.lastname: Sekuler
authors.forename: Patrick J
authors.initials: PJ
authors.lastname: Bennett
authors.forename: Robert
authors.initials: R
authors.lastname: Sekuler
mesh_terms: D002755:Choice Behavior / Q000502:physiology; D004192:Discrimination, Psychological / Q000502:physiology; D006801:Humans; D007600:Judgment / Q000502:physiology; D008569:Memory Disorders / Q000523:psychology*; D008570:Memory, Short-Term / Q000502:physiology*; D009622:Noise; D016011:Normal Distribution; D010470:Perceptual Masking / Q000502:physiology; D013647:Task Performance and Analysis; D013997:Time Factors; D014796:Visual Perception / Q000502:physiology*