Visual very-short-term memory is nonassociative.

Abstract
Presented an array of alternating black digits and letters on a white background to 8 undergraduates for 50 msec. at an illumination of 20 ft-L, followed by a dark delay varying from 200 msec. to 2 sec., followed by a black test character on a gray background (500 msec. at .11 ft-L), followed by 4 sec. in which Ss recalled the character appearing to the right of the position of the test character. A visual very-short-term memory trace was obtained for 6 out of 8 Ss, decaying with a time constant of about 2 sec. All Ss had a substantial "nondecaying" tachistoscopic memory component. Presenting as a test character the character which had actually appeared in that position in the preceding array did not enhance recall at any delay for any S by comparison to presenting a dummy character in that position. Thus, tachistoscopic memory is nonassociative. Memory for position is by an ordered, 2-dimensional array of locations, not by associations between character representatives. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2006 APA, all rights reserved)