Short-Term Memory: Psychological and Neural Aspects

Short-term memory involves the maintenance of a limited amount of currently relevant information through sustained patterns of neural activity. This article describes the potential and limitations of this ability and how this concept relates to other psychological constructs, such as working memory and attention. This article also describes our current understanding of how short-term memory is enabled and constrained by the function and structure of neural circuits and systems, including the functional organization of prefrontal cortex and the role that its interactions with other brain areas play in short-term memory.