the vision
and memory lab

department of psychology, university of california, san diego

Publications

Publications and Preprints

Book

Brady, T.F., and Bainbridge, W.A. (Eds.) (2022). Visual Memory. Routledge. Book link, including table of contents.

Submitted

Schurgin, M. W., Cunningham, C. A., Egeth, H. E. and Brady, T.F. (2018). Visual Long-term Memory Can Replace Active Storage in Visual Working Memory. bioRxiv. Preprint.
Babic, Z., Schurgin, M.W., and Brady, T.F. (2019). Is short-term storage correlated with fluid intelligence? Strategy use explains the apparent relationship between 'number of remembered items' and fluid intelligence. PsyArXiv. Preprint. OSF Data/Analysis.
Khvostov, V.A., Markov, Y.A., Brady, T.F., and Utochkin, I.S. (2020). Limitations on animacy categorization in ensemble perception. PsyArXiv. Preprint. OSF Data/Stimuli/Analysis.
Fougnie, D.L., Karabay, A., Alvarez, G.A.A., and Brady, T.F. (2022). If at first you don’t succeed, try, try again: Second chances reveal more information in working memory. PsyArXiv. Preprint.
Wang, Y., Brady, T.F. (2022). Intuitive Global Mean Estimation in Scatterplots with Spatial Clusters. PsyArXiv. Preprint.
Chunharas, C., Brady, T.F. (2023). Chunking, attraction, repulsion and ensemble effects are ubiquitous in visual working memory. PsyArXiv. Preprint.
Williams, L., Störmer, V.S., Brady, T.F. (2023). The working memory advantage for meaningful stimuli persists under high levels of proactive interference. PsyArXiv. Preprint.
Shafer-Skelton, A., Brady, T.F., Serences, J.T., (2024). A 2D Gabor-wavelet baseline model out-performs a 3D surface model in scene-responsive cortex. bioRxiv. Preprint.
DeStefano, I., Vul, E., Brady, T.F. (2024). Beyond Uniform Perception: Individual and Stimulus-Specific Differences in Visual Working Memory. PsyArXiv. Preprint.
Schill Hendley, H., Pallis-Hassani, N. K. Brady, T.F. (2024). Ensemble Perception of Faces with Naturalistic Occlusions. PsyArXiv. Preprint.
Chung, Y.H., Williams, L., Brady, T.F., Störmer, V.S. (2024). Limits of verbal labels in cognition: Category labels do not improve visual working memory performance for obfuscated objects. PsyArXiv. Preprint.
Robinson, M.M., Brady, T.F. (2024). Simple readout, complex behaviour via a generative model of confidence. PsyArXiv. Preprint.

Publications

Chung, Y.H., Brady, T.F., Störmer, V.S., (in press). Meaningfulness and familiarity expand visual working memory capacity. Current Directions in Psychological Science. PDF. Preprint. Journal link..
Robinson, M. M., Williams, J.R., Wixted, J., Brady, T.F. (in press). Zooming in on what counts as core and auxiliary: A case study on recognition models of visual working-memory. Psychonomic Bulletin and Review. Preprint.
Bays, P.M., Schneegans, S., Ma, W.J., Brady, T.F. (2024). Representation and computation in working memory. Nature Human Behaviour, https://doi.org/10.1038/s41562-024-01871-2. Nature website. PDF.. Preprint.
Brady, T.F. and Störmer, V.S. (2024). Comparing memory capacity across stimuli requires maximally dissimilar foils: Using deep convolutional neural networks to understand visual working memory capacity for real-world objects. Memory and Cognition, 52(3), 595-509, doi: 10.3758/s13421-023-01485-5. Springer website.. PDF. Preprint. OSF Data/Stimuli/Analysis.
Chung, Y.H, Brady, T.F., and Störmer, V.S. (2024). Sequential encoding aids working memory for meaningful objects' identities but not for their colors. Memory and Cognition, https://doi.org/10.3758/s13421-023-01486-4. PDF. Preprint. OSF Data/Stimuli/Analysis.
Brady, T.F., Robinson, M. M., Williams, J.R. (2024). Noisy and hierarchical visual memory across time scales. Nature Reviews Psychology, 3, 147–163. https://doi.org/10.1038/s44159-024-00276-2. Nature website. PDF.
Robinson, M. M., DeStefano, I., Vul, E., Brady, T.F. (2024). Local but not global graph theoretic measures of semantic networks generalize across tasks. Behavior Research Methods, oi: 10.3758/s13428-023-02271-6. Springer website. PDF. Preprint. OSF Data/Stimuli/Analysis.
Jabar, S.B., Sreenivasan, K.K. Lentzou, S., Kanabar, A., Brady, T.F., and Fougnie, D. (2023). Probabilistic and rich individual working memories revealed by a betting game. Scientific Reports, 13, 20912, https://doi.org/10.1038/s41598-023-48242-x. Nature website. PDF. Preprint.
Robinson, M. M., DeStefano, I., Vul, E., Brady, T.F. (2023). How do people build up visual memory representations from sensory evidence? Revisiting two classic models of choice. Journal of Mathematical Psychology, 117, 102805. PDF. Preprint.
Cohen, M., Keefe, J. M. and Brady, T.F. (2023). Perceptual awareness occurs along a graded continuum: No evidence of all-or-none failures in continuous reproduction tasks. Psychological Science, 34(9), 1033-1047. PDF. Preprint. OSF Data/Stimuli/Analysis.
Robinson, M. M., Brady, T.F. (2023). A quantitative model of ensemble perception as summed activation in feature space. Nature Human Behaviour, https://doi.org/10.1038/s41562-023-01602-z. Nature website. PDF. Preprint. OSF Data/Stimuli/Analysis.
Schill, H.M., Gray, S., and Brady, T.F. (2023). Visual Hindsight Bias for Abnormal Mammograms in Radiologists. Journal of Medical Imaging, 10(S1), S11910. PDF.
Chung, Y.H, Brady, T.F., and Störmer, V.S. (2023). No fixed limit for storing simple visual features: Realistic objects provide an efficient scaffold for holding features in mind. Psychological Science. PDF. Preprint. OSF Data/Stimuli/Analysis.
Chung, Y.H, Schurgin, M.W. Brady, T.F. (2023). The role of motion in visual working memory for dynamic stimuli: more lagged but more precise representations of moving objects. Attention, Perception and Psychophysics, https://doi.org/10.3758/s13414-022-02635-8. PDF. Preprint. OSF Data/Stimuli/Analysis.
Wang, Y., Lew, T.F., Brady, T.F., Vul, E. (2023). Structured Visuospatial Representations Revealed through Serial Reproduction. Journal of Experimental Psychology: Human Perception and Performance, 10.1037/xhp0001086. PDF.. Preprint.
Brady, T.F., Robinson, M. M., Williams, J. R., & Wixted, J. (2023). Measuring memory is harder than you think: How to avoid problematic measurement practices in memory research. Psychonomic Bulletin and Review, 30(2):421-449. doi: 10.3758/s13423-022-02179-w. PDF. Preprint.
Williams, J.R.*, Robinson, M. M.*, Brady, T.F. (2022). There is no theory-free measure of "swaps" in visual working memory experiments. Computational Brain & Behavior, https://doi.org/10.1007/s42113-022-00150-5. PDF. Preprint. OSF Data/Stimuli/Analysis.
Williams, J. R., Robinson, M. M., Schurgin, M.W., Wixted, J.T., and Brady, T.F. (2022). You can’t "count" how many items people remember in working memory: The importance of signal detection-based measures for understanding change detection performance. Journal of Experimental Psychology: Human Perception and Performance, 48(12):1390-1409. doi: 10.1037/xhp0001055. PDF. Preprint. OSF Data/Stimuli/Analysis.
Goldenberg, A., Schöne, J., Huang, Z., Sweeny, T., Ong, D. C., Brady, T.F., Robinson, M.M., Levari, D., Zaki, J., Gross, J. (2022). Amplification in the Evaluation of Emotional Expressions Over Time. Nature Human Behaviour, https://doi.org/10.1038/s41562-022-01390-y. Nature website. PDF. Preprint. OSF Data/Stimuli/Analysis.
Chunharas, C., Rademaker, R. L., Brady, T.F., and Serences, J. (2022). An adaptive perspective on visual working memory distortions. Journal of Experimental Psychology: General. PDF. Preprint. OSF Data/Stimuli/Analysis.
Williams, J., Brady, T.F., and Störmer, V.S. (2022). Guidance of attention by working memory is a matter of representational fidelity. Journal of Experimental Psychology: Human Perception and Performance, 48(3) https://doi.org/10.1037/xhp0000985. PDF. Preprint. Presentation at Virtual WM symposium (~12 min)..
Brady, T.F. and Störmer, V.S. (2022). The role of meaning in visual working memory: Real-world objects, but not simple features, benefit from deeper processing. Journal of Experimental Psychology: Learning, Memory and Cognition, 48(7), 942-958. PDF. Preprint. OSF Data/Stimuli/Analysis.
McColeman, C. M., Yang, F., Brady, T. F., Franconeri, S. (2021). Rethinking the Ranks of Visual Channels. IEEE Transactions on Visualization and Computer Graphics. Preprint. OSF Data/Stimuli/Analysis.   won honorable mention award, top 5%
O'Neill, K., Liu, A., Yin, S., Brady, T.F., and De Brigard, F. (2021). Effects of Category Learning Strategies on Recognition Memory. Memory and Cognition, 50, 512-526. https://doi.org/10.3758/s13421-021-01207-9. PDF. Preprint. OSF Data/Stimuli/Analysis.
DeStefano, I.C. and Brady, T.F., Vul. E. (2021). A Framework for Predicting Memory Errors with a Bayesian Model of Concept Generalization. Proceedings of the Cognitive Science Society. PDF. Preprint.
Allen, M.G., DeStefano, I.C. and Brady, T.F. (2021). Chunks are not "Content-Free": Hierarchical Representations Preserve Perceptual Detail within Chunks. Proceedings of the Cognitive Science Society. PDF. Preprint.
Schill, H.M., Wolfe, J.M., and Brady, T.F. (2021). Relationships between expertise and distinctiveness: abnormal medical images lead to enhanced memory performance only in experts. Memory and Cognition, 49, 1067-1081. doi: https://doi.org/10.3758/s13421-021-01160-7. Paper from journal. PDF. Preprint.
Markov, Y., Utochkin, I.S., and Brady, T.F. (2021). Real-world objects are not stored in holistic representations in visual working memory. Journal of Vision, 21(3): 18. Paper from JoV website. PDF. Preprint. OSF Data/Stimuli/Analysis.
Asp, I.E., Störmer, V.S., and Brady, T.F. (2021). Greater visual working memory capacity for visually-matched stimuli when they are recognized as meaningful. Journal of Cognitive Neuroscience, 33 (5): 902–918, https://doi.org/10.1162/jocn_a_01693. PDF. Preprint. OSF Data/Analysis.
Lau, J.S., Pashler, H., and Brady, T.F. (2021). Target Templates in Low Target-Distractor Discriminability Visual Search Have Higher Resolution, but the Advantage They Provide is Short-lived. Attention, Perception & Psychophysics, 83(4), 1435-1454, doi: 10.3758/s13414-020-02213-w PDF.Preprint. OSF Data/Stimuli/Analysis.
Schurgin, M. W., Wixted, J. T., and Brady, T.F. (2020). Psychophysical Scaling Reveals a Unified Theory of Visual Memory Strength. Nature Human Behaviour, 4(11), 1156-1172, https://doi.org/10.1038/s41562-020-00938-0. Nature website. PDF. Supplementary Materials. Preprint. OSF Data/Analysis.
Lau, J.S., and Brady, T.F. (2020). Noisy Perceptual Expectations: Multiple Object Tracking Benefits When Objects Obey Features of Realistic Physics. Journal of Experimental Psychology: Human Perception and Performance, 46(11), 1280-1300. PDF.. Preprint. OSF Data/Stimuli/Analysis
DeStefano, I., Vul, E., and Brady, T.F. (2020). Influences of both prior knowledge and recent history on visual working memory. Proceedings of the Cognitive Science Society. PDF. Preprint. Presentation at Virtual WM symposium (~12 min)..
Miner, A.E., Schurgin, M.W., and Brady, T.F. (2020). Is working memory inherently more ‘precise’ than long-term memory? Extremely high fidelity visual long-term memories for frequently encountered objects. Journal of Experimental Psychology: Human Perception and Performance, 46(8), 813-830. doi: 10.1037/xhp0000748. PDF. Preprint.
Utochkin, I.S., and Brady, T.F. (2020). Individual representations in visual working memory inherit ensemble properties. Journal of Experimental Psychology: Human Perception and Performance, 46(5): 458-473. 10.1037/xhp0000727. PDF. Preprint. OSF Data/Stimuli/Analysis
Rahnev, D., ... Brady, T.F. et al. (2020). The confidence database. Nature Human Behaviour, 4, 317-325. Nature website. PDF. Preprint. OSF Data/Analysis.
Urgolites, Z., Brady, T.F., and Wood, J. (2020). Verbal interference suppresses object-scene binding in visual long-term memory. PsyArXiv. Preprint.
Utochkin, I.S., and Brady, T. F. (2020). Independent storage of different features of real-world objects in long-term memory. Journal of Experimental Psychology: General, 149(3), 530-549. 10.1037/xge0000664. Preprint. PDF. OSF Data/Stimuli/Analysis
Brady, T. F. and Utochkin, I.S. (2019). Entities also require relational coding and binding (commentary on Bastin et al.). Behavioral and Brain Sciences, 42, E285. doi:10.1017/S0140525X19001924. Preprint: Our commentary. PDF: Bastin et al. target article. PDF: Our commentary.
Yin, S., O'Neill, K., Brady, T.F., and De Brigard, F. (2019). The Effect for Category Learning on Recognition Memory: A Signal Detection Theory Analysis. Proceedings of the Cognitive Science Society. Preprint. PDF.
Hurwitz, E., Brady, T.F., and Schachner, A. (2019). Detecting social transmission in the design of artifacts via inverse planning. Proceedings of the Cognitive Science Society. Preprint. PDF.
Schurgin, M. W., and Brady, T.F. (2019). When "capacity" changes with set size: Ensemble representations support the detection of across-category changes in visual working memory. Journal of Vision, 19(5):3. Preprint. PDF.
Brady, T.F., Störmer, V.S., Shafer-Skelton, A., Williams, J.R., Chapman, A.F., and Schill, H. (2019). Scaling up visual attention and visual working memory to the real world. Psychology of Learning and Motivation, 70. Preprint. PDF.
Brady, T. F., Alvarez, G., and Störmer, V. (2019). The role of meaning in visual memory: Face-selective brain activity predicts memory for ambiguous face stimuli. Journal of Neuroscience, 39 (6) 1100-1108. Preprint. PDF. OSF Data.
Shafer-Skelton, A. and Brady, T.F. (2019). 'Scene layout priming' relies primarily on low-level features rather than scene layout. Journal of Vision, 19 (14), doi:10.1167/19.1.14. Preprint. PDF.
Chunharas, C., Rademaker, R. L., Sprague, T. C., Brady, T.F., and Serences, J. (2019). Separating memoranda in depth increases visual working memory performance. Journal of Vision, 19(4), doi:10.1167/19.1.4. Preprint. PDF. OSF Data/Stimuli/Analysis.
Lau, J. S. and Brady, T.F. (2018). Ensemble Statistics Accessed through Proxies: Range Heuristic and Dependence on Low-Level Properties in Variability Discrimination. Journal of Vision, 18(3), doi:10.1167/18.9.3. Preprint. PDF.
Schachner, A., Brady, T. F., Oro, K., and Lee, M. (2018). Intuitive Archeology: Detecting social transmission in the design of artifacts. In C. Kalisch, M. Rau, T. Rogers, & J. Zhu, Proceedings of the 40th Annual Conference of the Cognitive Science Society, pg. 1037-1042. Preprint. PDF.
Brady, T. F., Schacter, D.L., and Alvarez, G.A. (2018). The adaptive nature of false memories is revealed by gist-based distortion of true memories. PsyArXiv. Preprint.
Chunharas, C., Brady, T.F., and Ramachandran, V.S. (2018). Selective Amplification of Salient Features of Visual Memories During Early Memory Consolidation. PsyArXiv. Preprint. OSF Data/Stimuli/Analysis.
Carr, E., Brady, T. F., and Winkielman, P. (2017). Are you smiling or have I seen you before? Familiarity makes faces look happier. Psychological Science., 28(8), 1087-1102. PDF.
Brady, T. F., Shafer-Skelton, A., and Alvarez, G.A. (2017). Global ensemble texture representations are critical to rapid scene perception. Journal of Experimental Psychology: Human Perception and Performance, 43(6), 1160-1176. Preprint. PDF.
De Brigard, F., Brady, T.F., Ruzic, L. and Schacter, D.L. (2017). Tracking the emergence of memories: A category-learning paradigm to explore schema-driven recognition. Memory and Cognition, 45(1), 105-120. Preprint. PDF.
Brady, T. F., Störmer, V., and Alvarez, G. A. (2016). Working memory is not fixed capacity: More active storage capacity for real-world objects than simple stimuli. Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, 113(27), 7459-7464. Preprint.. PDF.
Brady, T. F. and Alvarez, G.A. (2015). Contextual effects in visual working memory reveal hierarchically structured memory representations. Journal of Vision, 15(15):6. PDF. Open Access on JoV website.
Brady, T. F. and Alvarez, G.A. (2015). No evidence for a fixed object limit in working memory: Ensemble representations inflate estimates of working memory capacity for complex objects. Journal of Experimental Psychology: Learning, Memory and Cognition, 41(3), 921-9. PDF.
Haberman, J., Brady, T. F. and Alvarez, G.A. (2015). Individual differences in ensemble perception reveal multiple, independent levels of ensemble representation. Journal of Experimental Psychology: General, 144(2), 432-446. PDF.
Suchow, J., Fougnie, D., Brady, T. F. and Alvarez, G.A. (2014). Terms of the debate on the format and structure of visual memory. Attention, Perception & Psychophysics, 76(7), 2071-2079. PDF.   review
Brady, T. F., Konkle, T., Alvarez, G.A., and Oliva, A. (2013). Real-world objects are not represented as bound units: Independent forgetting of different object details from visual memory. Journal of Experimental Psychology: General, 142(3), 791-808. PDF.  selected as best JEP:General paper of the year by editoral board
Suchow, J. W.*, Brady, T. F.*, Fougnie, D. and Alvarez, G. A. (2013). Modeling visual working memory with the MemToolbox. Journal of Vision, 13(1), 9. PDF. Download MemToolbox.     * = authors contributed equally.
Brady, T. F., Konkle, T.F., Gill, J., Oliva, A. and Alvarez, G.A. (2013). Visual long-term memory has the same limit on fidelity as visual working memory. Psychological Science, 24(6), 981-990. PDF.
Brady, T. F., and Tenenbaum, J.B. (2013). A probabilistic model of visual working memory: Incorporating higher-order regularities into working memory capacity estimates. Psychological Review, 120(1), 85-109. PDF.
Brady, T. F., and Oliva, A. (2012). Spatial frequency integration during active perception: Perceptual hysteresis when an object recedes. Frontiers in Perception Science, 3 (462), doi: 10.3389/fpsyg.2012.00462. PDF. Open Access on Frontiers website.
Brady, T. F., Konkle, T, and Alvarez, G.A. (2011). A review of visual memory capacity: Beyond individual items and towards structured representations. Journal of Vision, 11(5):4, 1-34. PDF. Open Access on JoV website.   review
Brady, T. F. and Alvarez, G.A. (2011). Hierarchical encoding in visual working memory: ensemble statistics bias memory for individual items. Psychological Science, 22(3), 384-392. PDF.
Brady, T. F., Fougnie, D., and Alvarez, G.A. (2011). Comparisons between different measures of working memory capacity must be made with estimates that are derived from independent data [Response to Anderson et al.] Journal of Neuroscience, Oct. 14th. Paper.
Park, S., Brady, T. F., Greene, M.R., and Oliva, A. (2011). Disentangling scene content from spatial boundary: Complementary roles for the PPA and LOC in representing real-world scenes. Journal of Neuroscience, 31(4), 1333-1340. PDF.
Konkle, T.*, Brady, T. F.*, Alvarez, G.A. and Oliva, A. (2010). Scene memory is more detailed than you think: the role of categories in visual long-term memory. Psychological Science, 21(11), 1551-1556. PDF.     * = authors contributed equally
Brady, T. F. and Tenenbaum, J.B. (2010). Encoding higher-order structure in visual working memory: A probabilistic model. In S. Ohlsson & R.Catrambone (Eds.), Proceedings of the 32nd Annual Conference of the Cognitive Science Society (pp. 411-416). Austin, TX: Cognitive Science. PDF.
Konkle, T., Brady, T. F., Alvarez, G. A. and Oliva, A. (2010). Conceptual distinctiveness supports detailed visual long-term memory for real-world objects. Journal of Experimental Psychology: General, 139(3), 558-78. PDF.
Brady, T. F. and Alvarez, G. A. (2010). Ensemble statistics of a display influence the representation of items in visual working memory. Visual Cognition, 18 (1), 114-118. PDF.
Brady, T. F., Konkle, T., and Alvarez, G. A. (2009). Compression in visual working memory: using statistical regularities to form more efficient memory representations. Journal of Experimental Psychology: General, 138(4), 487-502. PDF.
Junge, J. A., Brady, T. F. and Chun, M. M. (2009). The contents of perceptual hypotheses: evidence from rapid resumption of interrupted visual search. Attention, Perception & Psychophysics, 71, 681-689. PDF.
Schachner, A., Brady, T. F., Pepperberg, I. and Hauser, M. (2009). Spontaneous motor entrainment to music in multiple vocal mimicking species. Current Biology, 19(10), 831-836. Sample videos of birds dancing. PDF.
Brady, T. F., Konkle, T., Oliva, A. and Alvarez, G. A. (2009). Detecting changes in real-world objects: The relationship between visual long-term memory and change blindness. Communicative & Integrative Biology, 2:1, 1-3. Open Access on CIB website. PDF.
Brady, T. F., Konkle, T., Alvarez, G. A. and Oliva, A. (2008). Visual long-term memory has a massive storage capacity for object details. Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, USA, 105 (38), 14325-14329. Open Access on PNAS website. Stimuli and Demos. PDF.
Brady, T. F., Konkle, T., and Alvarez, G. A. (2008). Efficient coding in visual short-term memory: Evidence for an information-limited capacity. In B. C. Love, K. McRae, & V. M. Sloutsky (Eds.), Proceedings of the 30th Annual Conference of the Cognitive Science Society (pp. 887-892). Austin, TX: Cognitive Science Society. PDF.
Brady, T. F. and Oliva, A. (2008). Statistical learning using real-world scenes: extracting categorical regularities without conscious intent. Psychological Science, 19(7), 678-685. PDF.
Brady, T. F. and Chun, M. M. (2007). Spatial constraints on learning in visual search: Modeling contextual cueing. Journal of Experimental Psychology: Human Perception & Performance, 33(4), 798-815. PDF.