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The Influence of Event Boundaries on Working Memory Updating

Poster Session F - Tuesday, March 10, 2026, 8:00 – 10:00 am PDT, Fairview/Kitsilano Ballroom

Ms Sophie Su¹ (), Jeremy Cohn¹, Sandra Xie¹, Jeffrey Zacks¹; ¹Washington University In St Louis

How do readers update their working event models? Two distinct mechanisms have been proposed: incremental updating, where people selectively update only changed dimensions, and global updating, in which any change triggers a complete model reconstruction. Across two experimental paradigms, we tested the hypothesis that people update incrementally within events and globally across events. In Experiment 1, participants read narratives with systematic changes in spatial, object, and goal dimensions. Intermittently, they answered recognition memory questions that followed (1) no shift, (2) a shift in the same dimension, (3) a shift in one different dimension, or (4) shifts in two different dimensions. Afterward, participants performed the segmentation task. Bayesian analysis of reaction times provided inconclusive evidence that people update incrementally within events and globally across events. Experiment 2 employed a novel implicit reading-time paradigm to examine updating mechanisms during natural reading without interruption. Participants read narratives of everyday activities in which the target dimension (space, object, or goal) either matched or mismatched previously established information, while non-target dimensions either repeated or shifted. Afterward, they again performed the segmentation task. Pilot data supported our hypothesis: readers showed evidence of global updating across event boundaries, reflected in reduced processing time for target mismatches when preceded by non-target switches. Preliminary data from both experiments are inconclusive, though some patterns tentatively support incremental updating within events and global updating across boundaries. This shift from incremental to global updating demonstrates the stability–flexibility balance that people engage to understand the world around them.

Topic Area: OTHER