Stimulus Onset Asynchronies in Audio-visual Serial Recall Performance (vor Ort)
* Presenting author
Abstract:
Multisensory integration has mostly been studied with focus on perceptual effects. Only few examples exist that demonstrate multisensory enhancement, e.g., for object recognition, based on semantic integration, i.e., the combination of stimulus features to form a coherent perceptual representation of the object. However, it is unclear how these perceptual benefits support more complex cognitive processes. To study the relevance of audiovisual perception for these processes systematically, short-term memory is proposed as a suitable target for further investigations. This study makes an initial attempt to present audiovisual stimuli in a serial recall task and to compare task performance across uni- and multi-modal stimulation. Volunteers will be presented with numbers one to nine in random order which they are asked to recall after a retention interval. Acoustic stimuli consist of spoken number words presented diotically via headphones, and visual stimuli are numerals printed on a screen. Only congruent stimulus pairs are considered in the audio-visual case. As a further step, stimulus onset asynchronies are introduced in the presentation of the audio-visual stimuli to assess the influence of simultaneity on serial recall performance.
