Does visual short‐term memory store bound features?

Abstract

The storage of visual short-term memory (VSTM) capacity for objects defined by features from the same dimension (colour) and from separate dimensions (texture and shape) was assessed in four experiments. In agreement with the framework proposed by Wheeler and Treisman (2002) concerning binding in VSTM, it is shown that features from the same dimension compete for storage capacity while features from separate dimensions are relatively stored in parallel. Furthermore, evidence is offered that integration between object features can be stored in VSTM, just as well as single features, provided that features from that object are encoded as the components of a single unitary object. When features are processed as properties of separate objects, integration of these features is poorly stored in VSTM.