What influences the automaticity of feature binding? The roles of unitisation, culture and prior knowledge

Feature binding means integrating different features, such as colour and shape, into coherent objects in working memory (WM). The automaticity of feature binding may depend on whether the to-be-bound information is intrinsic (belonging to) or extrinsic (contextual). Furthermore, according to the Analytic and Holistic framework, extrinsic binding may be more automatic for Easterners who process information more holistically than Westerners. Additionally, prior knowledge in long-term memory (LTM) may facilitate binding in WM, such that Eastern participants may more automatically integrate extrinsic features that are further facilitated by LTM in Western participants. Whether the basic unit of storage in WM is object-based (store information as coherent object representation), feature-based (store information as independent features) or that both co-exist in WM may also influence the automaticity of feature binding. Based on this background, this thesis investigated how unitisation (Experiments 1 to 4), culture (Experiments 1 to 3), prior knowledge (Experiment 2) and the basic unit of storage in WM (Experiment 4) influence the automaticity of feature binding in four experiments. Accordingly, in Experiments 1, 2 and 3, I recruited Western and Eastern participants to complete a visual WM task wherein to-be-remembered colours are integrated within (i.e., intrinsic binding) or as backgrounds (i.e., extrinsic binding) of to-be-remembered shapes. In Experiment 4, I recruited Western participants to complete a continuous report paradigm with briefly presented arrays of individually calibrated numbers of shapes. Participants were required to recall the colour or location of the probed shape. The current results suggest that the automaticity of feature binding in WM depends on unitisation and the basic unit of storage in WM, but not cultural differences or prior knowledge. In addition, both feature-based and object-based storage may co-exist in WM, but whether WM is more feature-based or object-based storage depends on unitisation.