title: When expectation confounds iconic memory.
abstract: In response to the methodological criticism (Bachmann & Aru, 2015) of the interpretation of their earlier experimental results (Mack, Erol, & Clarke, 2015) Mack, Erol, Clarke, and Bert (2016) presented new results that they interpret again in favor of the stance that an attention-free phenomenal iconic store does not exist. Here we once more question their conclusions. When their subjects were unexpectedly asked to report the letters instead of the post-cued circles in the 101th trial where letters were actually absent, they likely failed to see the empty display area because prior experience with letters in the preceding trials produced expectancy based illusory experience of letter-like objects.
authors.affiliation: Faculty of Law, Institute of Penal Law, University of Tartu (Tallinn Branch), Estonia. Electronic address: talis.bachmann@ut.ee.
authors.forename: Talis
authors.initials: T
authors.lastname: Bachmann
authors.affiliation: Faculty of Law, Institute of Penal Law, University of Tartu (Tallinn Branch), Estonia; Faculty of Mathematics and Computer Science, University of Tartu (Tallinn Branch), Estonia. Electronic address: jaan.aru@gmail.com.
authors.forename: Jaan
authors.initials: J
authors.lastname: Aru
mesh_terms: D001288:Attention; D003463:Cues; D006801:Humans; D008568:Memory; D009042:Motivation
keywords: Attention; Iconic memory; Precision; Predictive coding; Prior