People look at emptied spatial locations where information has been presented during encoding. There is evidence that this socalled ‘looking at nothing’ behaviour plays a functional role in memory retrieval of visuospatial and verbal information. However, it is unclear whether this effect is caused by the oculomotor movement of the eyes per se or if covertly shifting attention is sufficient to cause the observed differences in retrieval performance. In an experimental study (N = 26), participants were manipulated in being able to shift either their eyes or their focus of attention to a blank spatial location whilst retrieving verbal information that was associated with the location during a preceding encoding phase. Results indicate that it is not the oculomotor movement of the eyes that causes the facilitation while retrieving verbal materials, but rather covert shifts of attention are sufficient to promote differences in retrieval performance.

When finding a best explanation for observed symptoms a multitude of information has to be integrated and matched against explanations stored in memory. Although assumptions about ongoing memory processes can be derived from the process models, little process data exists that would allow to sufficiently test these assumptions. In order to explore memory processes in diagnostic reasoning, 29 participants were asked to solve a visual reasoning task (the Black Box paradigm) where critical information had to be retrieved from memory. This study focused on differentiating between processes that take place during the encoding and the evaluation of symptom information by comparing eye movement measures (the number of fixation and fixation duration per dwell). Results will be discussed in light of existing theories on sequential diagnostic reasoning. Further, it will be discussed to which extent eye movements can be informative about memory processes underlying sequential diagnostic reasoning.