Editing Working memory (section)

====Interference theories====

Several forms of [[Interference theory|interference]] have been discussed by theorists. One of the oldest ideas is that new items simply replace older ones in working memory. Another form of interference is retrieval competition. For example, when the task is to remember a list of 7 words in their order, we need to start recall with the first word. While trying to retrieve the first word, the second word, which is represented in proximity, is accidentally retrieved as well, and the two compete for being recalled. Errors in serial recall tasks are often confusions of neighboring items on a memory list (so-called transpositions), showing that retrieval competition plays a role in limiting our ability to recall lists in order, and probably also in other working memory tasks. A third form of interference is the distortion of representations by superposition: When multiple representations are added on top of each other, each of them is blurred by the presence of all the others.<ref>{{cite journal |last1=Oberauer |first1=Klaus |last2=Lewandowsky |first2=Stephan |last3=Farrell |first3=Simon |last4=Jarrold |first4=Christopher |last5=Greaves |first5=Martin |title=Modeling working memory: An interference model of complex span |journal=Psychonomic Bulletin & Review |date=October 2012 |volume=19 |issue=5 |pages=779–819 |doi=10.3758/s13423-012-0272-4 |pmid=22715024 |url=https://www.zora.uzh.ch/id/eprint/63536/1/ZORA_NL_63536.pdf }}</ref> A fourth form of interference assumed by some authors is feature overwriting.<ref>{{Cite journal|doi=10.1016/j.jml.2006.08.009 |title=A formal model of capacity limits in working memory |date=November 2006 | vauthors = Oberauer K, Kliegl R |journal=Journal of Memory and Language |volume=55 |issue=4 |pages=601–26|doi-access=free }}</ref><ref>{{cite journal | vauthors = Bancroft T, Servos P | title = Distractor frequency influences performance in vibrotactile working memory | journal = Experimental Brain Research | volume = 208 | issue = 4 | pages = 529–532 | date = February 2011 | pmid = 21132280 | doi = 10.1007/s00221-010-2501-2 | s2cid = 19743442 }}</ref> The idea is that each word, digit, or other item in working memory is represented as a bundle of features, and when two items share some features, one of them steals the features from the other. As more items are held in working memory, whose features begin to overlap, the more each of them will be degraded by the loss of some features.{{citation needed|date=July 2022}}