Adaptive behavior relies on the selection of relevant sensory information from both the external environment and internal memory representations. In understanding external selection, a classic distinction is made between voluntary (goal-directed) and involuntary (stimulus-driven) guidance of attention. We have developed a task—the anti-retrocue task—to separate and examine voluntary and involuntary guidance of attention to internal representations in visual working memory. We show that both voluntary and involuntary factors influence memory performance but do so in distinct ways. Moreover, by tracking gaze biases linked to attentional focusing in memory, we provide direct evidence for an involuntary “retro-capture” effect whereby external stimuli involuntarily trigger the selection of feature-matching internal representations. We show that stimulus-driven and goal-directed influences compete for selection in memory, and that the balance of this competition—as reflected in oculomotor signatures of internal attention—predicts the quality of ensuing memory-guided behavior. Thus, goal-directed and stimulus-driven factors together determine the fate not only of perception, but also of internal representations in working memory.

适应性行为依赖于从外部环境和内部记忆表征中选择相关的感官信息。在理解外部选择时，一个典型的区别是自愿（目标导向）和非自愿（刺激驱动）注意力引导。我们开发了一项任务——反回溯任务——来分离和检查对视觉工作记忆中内部表征的自愿和非自愿指导。我们表明，自愿和非自愿因素都会影响记忆表现，但影响方式不同。此外，通过跟踪与记忆中注意力聚焦相关的注视偏差，我们为非自愿“回顾捕获”效应提供了直接证据，即外部刺激不自觉地触发特征匹配内部表征的选择。我们表明，刺激驱动和目标导向的影响会竞争记忆中的选择，并且这种竞争的平衡（反映在内部注意力的动眼神经特征中）可以预测随后的记忆引导行为的质量。因此，目标导向和刺激驱动的因素不仅决定了感知的命运，还决定了工作记忆中内部表征的命运。