Memory Representations Recruited in Visuo-Haptic Cross-Modal Matching of Novel Objects and their Associations with Cognitive Styles

Abstract

To perform many everyday tasks, one must be able to use touch to find what has previously been seen. Interestingly, recent research has identified that when individuals view or touch an object, they may create a verbal memory representation; however, this research involved object naming, which may have prompted the use of verbal strategies. Past research has also identified variability in memory representations for objects, which may indicate that there are individual differences at play. To investigate memory representations and their association with individual differences in cognitive styles, we measured the cognitive styles of 127 undergraduate participants, and had them complete a non-verbal matching task where they viewed an object and then touched an object – or vice versa - and indicated whether the two objects were congruent or incongruent. Participants completed the task without distractors, or with verbal or visual distractors. Participants responded consistently faster for trials where they touched an object first. On these trials, they were also more likely to erroneously respond that the objects were different; whereas in trials where participants viewed an object first, they were more likely to erroneously respond that the objects were identical. On trials where different objects were presented, participants responded consistently more slowly and made more matching errors for similar objects compared to distinct objects. Finally, the representations that participants used in cross-modal object matching may be verbally facilitated, since higher scores on the verbalizer cognitive style were associated with faster reaction times on the matching task when no distractors were present. Overall, this indicates that cross-modal object processing in short-term memory may be facilitated by a verbal code; however, the addition of distractors may prompt participants to recruit more idiosyncratic strategies.