ORIGINAL RESEARCH article
Front. Psychol.
Sec. Cognitive Science
Volume 16 - 2025 | doi: 10.3389/fpsyg.2025.1594306
This article is part of the Research TopicAttention Mechanisms and Cross-Modal Integration in Language and Visual CognitionView all 8 articles
Audiovisual Integration of Simple Stimuli: Spatial Congruency Effects Unaffected by Working Memory Load
Provisionally accepted
- 1School of Education, Suzhou University of Science and Technology, Suzhou, Liaoning Province, China
- 2College of Teacher Education, Wenzhou University, Wenzhou, Zhejiang Province, China
- 3School of Philosophy and Sociology, Jilin University, Changchun, Jilin Province, China
- 4Changchun University of Science and Technology, Changchun, Jilin Province, China
- 5Graduate School of Interdisciplinary Science and Engineering in Health Systems, Okayama University, Okayama, Okayama, Japan
Select one of your emails
You have multiple emails registered with Frontiers:
Notify me on publication
Please enter your email address:
If you already have an account, please login
You don't have a Frontiers account ? You can register here
The present study sought to investigate whether working memory (WM) load influences the spatial congruency effect in audiovisual (AV) integration using simple stimuli. Participants completed an AV localization task under three WM load conditions (0-back, 1-back, 2-back), Spatially congruent AV stimuli consistently facilitated responses regardless of working memory (WM) load. Statistical analyses found no significant interactions between WM load and audiovisual integration for reaction time (RT), accuracy, sensitivity (d'), or auditory enhancement effects (p < 0.05). Critically, Bayesian analysis in the present study provided strong evidence against the existence of such an interaction (BF ≈ 0.0001), although independent replication is warranted to confirm this finding. These findings indicate that spatially congruent AV integration is robust across different levels of working memory load, suggesting that it occurs at a low-level perceptual stage and is automatic.
Keywords: Audiovisual integration, spatial congruency, Working memory load, multisensory processing, Automatic integration, Bayesian Analysis
Received: 15 Mar 2025; Accepted: 19 Jun 2025.
Copyright: © 2025 Chen, Li, Tao, Xu, Gao, Yang and Wu. This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (CC BY). The use, distribution or reproduction in other forums is permitted, provided the original author(s) or licensor are credited and that the original publication in this journal is cited, in accordance with accepted academic practice. No use, distribution or reproduction is permitted which does not comply with these terms.
* Correspondence:
Yulin Gao, School of Philosophy and Sociology, Jilin University, Changchun, 130012, Jilin Province, China
Jingjing Yang, Changchun University of Science and Technology, Changchun, 130022, Jilin Province, China
Qiong Wu, School of Education, Suzhou University of Science and Technology, Suzhou, 215009, Liaoning Province, China
Disclaimer: All claims expressed in this article are solely those of the authors and do not necessarily represent those of their affiliated organizations, or those of the publisher, the editors and the reviewers. Any product that may be evaluated in this article or claim that may be made by its manufacturer is not guaranteed or endorsed by the publisher.