The paper presents an experimental evidence on differences in the sentence-picture verification under additional memory load between parity and proportional quantifiers. We asked subjects to memorize strings of 4 or 6 digits, then to decide whether a quantifier sentence is true at a given picture, and finally to recall the initially given string of numbers. The results show that: (a) proportional quantifiers are more difficult than parity quantifiers with respect to reaction time and accuracy; (b) maintaining either 4 or (...) 6 elements in the workingmemory has the same effect on the processing of parity quantifiers; (c) however, in the case of proportional quantifiers subjects performed better in the verification tasks under the 6-digit load condition, and (d) even though the strings of 4 numbers were better recalled by subjects after judging parity there is no difference between quantifiers in the case of the 6-element condition. We briefly outline two alternative explanations for the observed phenomena rooted in the computational model of quantifier verification and the different theories of workingmemory. (shrink)
The paper presents a study examining the role of working<br>memory in quantifier verification. We created situations similar to the<br>span task to compare numerical quantifiers of low and high rank, parity<br>quantifiers and proportional quantifiers. The results enrich and support<br>the data obtained previously in and predictions drawn from a computational<br>model.
Johnson-Laird's mental models theory claims that reasoning is a semantic process of construction and manipulation of models in workingmemory of limited capacity. Accordingly, both a deduction and a given interpretation of a premise would be all the harder the higher the number of models they require. The purpose of the present experiment was twofold. First, it aimed to demonstrate that the interpretation of if...then conditional sentences in children (third, sixth, and ninth graders) evolves as a function of (...) the number of models the children can produce. We proposed a theory of conditional reasoning development that hypothesises a developmental trend of three successive levels of interpretations underlain by one, two, and then three models, i.e. conjunctive, biconditional, and conditional respectively. Second, we aimed to show that these different levels correlate with workingmemory capacities: the higher the workingmemory span, the higher the number of models underlying the conditional interpretation. These two hypotheses were verified, supporting the mental models theory. The results are compared with the rival theory of mental logic. (shrink)
The authors' results support a functionalist conception of workingmemory: a manifold repertoire of schemes/schemas (long-term memory) and a small set of general-purpose “hidden operators.” Using some of these operators I define mental (i.e., endogenous) attention. Then, analyzing two of the authors' unexplained important findings, I illustrate the mental-attention model's explanatory power. Multivariate methodology that varies developmental, task differences, and individual differences is recommended.
Single-unit data from the cortex of monkeys performing working-memory tasks support the main point of the target article. Those data, however, also indicate that the activation of long-term memory is essential to the processing of all cognitive functions. The activation of cortical long-term memory networks is a key neural mechanism in attention (workingmemory is a form thereof), perception, memory acquisition and retrieval, intelligence, and language.
Blair proposes that fluid intelligence, workingmemory, and executive function form a unitary construct: fluid cognition. Recently, our group has utilized a combined correlational–experimental cognitive neuroscience approach, which we argue is beneficial for investigating relationships among these individual differences in terms of neural mechanisms underlying them. Our data do not completely support Blair's strong position. (Published Online April 5 2006).
Although workingmemory capacity and executive function contribute to human intelligence, we question whether there is an equivalence between them and fluid intelligence. We contend that any satisfactory neurobiological explanation of fluid intelligence needs to include abstraction as an important computational component of brain processing. (Published Online April 5 2006).
Working-memory retention as activated long-term memory fails to capture orchestrated processing and storage, the hallmark of the concept of workingmemory. The event-related potential (ERP) data are compatible with workingmemory as a mental workspace that holds and manipulates information on line, which is distinct from long-term memory, and deals with the products of activated traces from stored knowledge.
Religionists often presuppose that “mysticism” aims at somehow emptying the mind. In the light of evidence, however, meditation seems rather to consist of ritualized action without an explicit emphasis on subjective experience. Boyer & Lienard's (B&L's) theory of ritualized action as “swamping” workingmemory thus might help explain the effects of meditation without postulating experiential goals the “mystics” obviously do not have. (Published Online February 8 2007).
Three experiments explore the role of workingmemory in motor skill acquisition and performance. Traditional theories postulate that skill acquisition proceeds through stages of knowing, which are initially declarative but later procedural. The reported experiments challenge that view and support an independent, parallel processing model, which predicts that procedural and declarative knowledge can be acquired separately and that the former does not depend on the availability of workingmemory, whereas, the latter does. The behaviour of these (...) two processes was manipulated by providing or withholding visual (and auditory) appraisal of outcome feedback. Withholding feedback was predicted to inhibit the use of workingmemory to appraise success and, thus, prevent the formation of declarative knowledge without affecting the accumulation of procedural knowledge. While the first experiment failed to support these predictions, the second and third experiments demonstrated that procedural and declarative knowledge can be acquired independently. It is suggested that the availability of workingmemory is crucial to motor performance only when the learner has come to rely on its use. (shrink)
This study examined the hypothesis that conditional reasoning involves visual short-term memory resources (Johnson-Laird, 1985). A total of 147 university students were given measures of verbal and visual short-term memory capacity and a series of concrete and abstract conditional reasoning problems. Results indicate that there is a positive correlation between verbal workingmemory capacity and reasoning with both concrete and abstract premises. A positive correlation was also obtained between visual workingmemory capacity and reasoning (...) with concrete premises. (shrink)
Temporal binding via 40-Hz synchronization of neuronal discharges in sensory cortices has been hypothesized to be a necessary condition for the rapid selection of perceptually relevant information for further processing in workingmemory. Binocular rivalry experiments have shown that late stage visual processing associated with the recognition of a stimulus object is highly correlated with discharge rates in inferotemporal cortex. The hippocampus is the primary recipient of inferotemporal outputs and is known to be the substrate for the consolidation (...) of working memories to long-term, episodic memories. The prefrontal cortex, on the other hand, is widely thought to mediate workingmemory processes, per se. This article reviews accumulated evidence for the role of a subcortical matrix in linking frontal and hippocampal systems to select and ''stream'' conscious episodes across time (hundreds of milliseconds to several seconds). ''Streaming'' is hypothesized to be mediated by the selective gating of reentrant flows of information between these cortical systems and the subcortical matrix. The physiological mechanism proposed for this temporally extended form of binding is synchronous oscillations in the slower EEG spectrum (< 8 Hz). (shrink)
Neural models have proposed how short-term memory (STM) storage in workingmemory and long-term memory (LTM) storage and recall are linked and interact, but are realized by different mechanisms that obey different laws. The authors' data can be understood in the light of these models, which suggest that the authors may have gone too far in obscuring the differences between these processes.
High temporal resolution event-related brain potential and electroencephalographic coherence studies of the neural substrate of short-term storage in workingmemory indicate that the sustained coactivation of both prefrontal cortex and the posterior cortical systems that participate in the initial perception and comprehension of the retained information are involved in its storage. These studies further show that short-term storage mechanisms involve an increase in neural synchrony between prefrontal cortex and posterior cortex and the enhanced activation of long-term memory (...) representations of material held in short-term memory. This activation begins during the encoding/comprehension phase and evidently is prolonged into the retention phase by attentional drive from prefrontal cortex control systems. A parsimonious interpretation of these findings is that the long-term memory systems associated with the posterior cortical processors provide the necessary representational basis for workingmemory, with the property of short-term memory decay being primarily due to the posterior system. In this view, there is no reason to posit specialized neural systems whose functions are limited to those of short-term storage buffers. Prefrontal cortex provides the attentional pointer system for maintaining activation in the appropriate posterior processing systems. Short-term memory capacity and phenomena such as displacement of information in short-term memory are determined by limitations on the number of pointers that can be sustained by the prefrontal control systems. Key Words: coherence; event-related potentials; imaging; long-term memory; memory; short-term memory; workingmemory. (shrink)
We examine the role of workingmemory's central executive in the mental model explanation of propositional reasoning by using two workingmemory measures: the classical “reading span” test by Daneman and Carpenter (1980) and a new measure. This new “reasoning span” measure requires individuals to solve very simple anaphora problems, and store and remember the word solution in a growing series of inferential problems. We present one experiment in which we check the involvement of the central (...) executive in conditional and disjunctive inference tasks and compare predictions of the new reasoning span test with those of the classical reading span test. The results of the experiment confirm that reasoning responses, which according to mental model theory require high cognitive work, are predicted by workingmemory measures. Results also show that some reasoning responses are probably obtained by means of superficial biases or strategies that do not load workingmemory. The reasoning span test, which involves the central executive to a greater degree, predicts reasoning performance better than the reading span test. The significance and possibilities of the new measure in studying reasoning are discussed. (shrink)
Three experiments explore the role of workingmemory in motor skill acquisition and performance. Traditional theories postulate that skill acquisition proceeds through stages of knowing, which are initially declarative but later procedural. The reported experiments challenge that view and support an independent, parallel processing model, which predicts that procedural and declarative knowledge can be acquired separately and that the former does not depend on the availability of workingmemory, whereas, the latter does. The behaviour of these (...) two processes was manipulated by providing or withholding visual (and auditory) appraisal of outcome feedback. Withholding feedback was predicted to inhibit the use of workingmemory to appraise success and, thus, prevent the formation of declarative knowledge without affecting the accumulation of procedural knowledge. While the first experiment failed to support these predictions, the second and third experiments demonstrated that procedural and declarative knowledge can be acquired independently. It is suggested that the availability of workingmemory is crucial to motor performance only when the learner has come to rely on its use. (shrink)
Blair equates the constructs of workingmemory (WM), executive function, and general fluid intelligence (gF). We argue that there is good reason not to equate these constructs. We view WM and gF as separable but highly related, and suggest that the mechanism behind the relationship is controlled attention – an ability that is dependent on normal functioning of the prefrontal cortex. (Published Online April 5 2006).
Different hypotheses about the mechanisms underlying workingmemory lead to different predictions about workingmemory capacity when information is distributed across the two hemispheres. We present preliminary data suggesting that memory scanning time (a parameter often associated with workingmemory capacity) varies depending on how information is subdivided across hemispheres. The data are consistent with a distributed model of workingmemory.
The ability to reason independently from one's own goals or beliefs has long been recognised as a key characteristic of the development of formal operational thought. In this article we present the results of a study that examined the correlates of this ability in a group of 10-year-old children ( N = 61). Participants were presented with conditional and relational reasoning items, where the content was manipulated such that the conclusion to the arguments were either congruent, neutral, or incongruent with (...) beliefs, and either logically valid or logically invalid. Participants also received a measure of workingmemory capacity (the counting span task) and a measure of inhibitory control (the stop signal task). Indices of belief bias and logical reasoning on belief-based problems were predicted independently by both measures. In contrast logical reasoning on belief neutral problems was predicted by workingmemory alone. The findings suggest that executive functions play a key role in the development of children's ability to decontextualise their thinking. (shrink)
In challenging current conceptions of the role of workingmemory in sentence processing, Caplan & Waters consider studies comparing young and older adults on sentence processing. This commentary raises two challenges to Caplan & Waters's conclusions: first, workingmemory tasks appear to be age invariant. Second, the production of complex syntactic constructions appears not to be age invariant.
Four experiments assessed the relative involvement of different workingmemory components in two types of reasoning tasks: propositional and spatial reasoning. Using the secondary-task methodology, visual, central-executive, and phonological loads were realised. Although the involvement of visuospatial resources in propositional reasoning has traditionally been considered to be small, an overall analysis of the present data suggests an alternative account. A theoretical analysis of the pattern of results in terms of Evans' (1984, 1989) twostage theory of reasoning is proposed (...) and tested in Experiments 3 and 4, in which direct evidence for the alternative account was obtained: significant disruption of propositional reasoning by a concurrent spatial load. (shrink)
The target article differentiates a new, syntactic component in verbal workingmemory. We suggest that several more components could be differentiated to make a model of workingmemory complete. Next, syntax is not always separable from the subject's verbal memory capacity as measured by standard workingmemory tasks. Finally, interference between different processes cannot be taken as evidence for the processes sharing the same resources. Interference might be a result of active mutual inhibition.
The present commentary agrees with many of the points made by Ruchkin et al., but brings up several important differences in assumptions. These assumptions have to do with the nature of the capacity limit in workingmemory and the possible bases of working-memory activation.
There is remarkable agreement between Ruchkin et al.'s psychophysiological views and my own model, based on developmental-experimental evidence, of workingmemory as activated long-term memory (LTM). I construe subvocal rehearsal as an operative scheme that maintains order information and demands attentional resources. Encoding and retrieving operations also demand attention. Another share of resources is used for keeping activated specific LTM representations.
This article reports three experiments that investigated the relationship between workingmemory capacity and syllogistic and five-term series spatial inference. A series of complex and simple verbal and spatial workingmemory measures were employed. Correlational analyses showed that verbal and spatial workingmemory span tasks consistently predicted syllogistic and spatial reasoning performance. A confirmatory factor analysis showed that three factors best accounted for the data--a verbal, a spatial, and a general factor. Syllogistic reasoning performance (...) loaded all three factors, whilst spatial reasoning loaded only the general factor. The implications of these findings are discussed in the context of reasoning theories and contemporary accounts of the structure of workingmemory. (shrink)
The present study is part of recent attempts to specify the characteristics of the counterexample retrieval process during causal conditional reasoning. The study tried to pinpoint whether the retrieval of stored counterexamples (alternative causes and disabling conditions) for a causal conditional is completely automatic in nature or whether the search process also demands executive workingmemory (WM) resources. In Experiment 1, participants were presented with a counterexample generation task and a measure of WM capacity. We found a positive (...) relation between search efficiency, as measured by the number of generated counterexamples in limited time, and WM capacity. Experiment 2 examined the effects of a secondary WM load on the retrieval performance. As predicted, burdening WM with an attention-demanding secondary task decreased the retrieval efficiency. Both low and high spans were affected by the WM load but load effects were less pronounced for the most strongly associated counterexamples. Findings established that in addition to an automatic search component, the counterexample retrieval draws on WM resources. (shrink)
We focus on the functional specificity of theta and alpha oscillations and show that theta is related to workingmemory, whereas alpha is related to semantic long-term memory. Recent studies, however, indicate that alpha oscillations also play an important role during short-term memory retention and retrieval. This latter finding provides support for the basic hypothesis suggested by Ruchkin et al.
Models of workingmemory challenge some aspects of Carruthers’ account but enhance others. Although the nature of the phonological store and central executive appear fully congruent with Carruthers’ proposal, current models of the visuo-spatial sketchpad provide a better account of skilled action. However, Carruthers’ model may provide a way around the homunculus problem that has plagued models of workingmemory.
We agree with Caplan & Waters that there are problems with the single-resource theory of sentence comprehension. However, we challenge their dual-resource alternative on theoretical and empirical grounds and point to a more coherent solution that abandons the notion of workingmemory resources.
In previous research, Toms, Morris, and Ward (1993) have shown that conditional reasoning is impaired by a concurrent task calling on executive functions but not by concurrent tasks that load on the slave systems of the workingmemory system as conceptualised by Baddeley and Hitch (1974). The present article replicates and extends this previous work by studying problems based on spatial as well as nonspatial relations. In the study 42 participants solved 16 types of spatial or nonspatial problems, (...) both in a single-task condition and under concurrent matrix tapping, a task loading the visuo-spatial sketch pad. The findings were consistent with those of Toms et al. (1993) for problems with a nonspatial content. However, when the content was spatial, and only then, a dual-task impairment was observed: processing time of the first premise was lengthened, especially for problems with negations in the antecedent term, the consequent term, or both; moreover, the number of correctly solved problems with negations in both terms was smaller. The implications of these findings for the mental models theory and the mental logic theory are discussed. (shrink)
Ruchkin et al. use brain-activity data from healthy subjects to assess the physiological validity of a cognitive workingmemory model and to propose modifications. The conclusions drawn from this data are interesting and plausible, but they have limitations. Much of what is known about the neural mechanisms of workingmemory comes from single neuron recordings in animals, and it is currently not fully understood how these translate to scalp recordings of EEG.
This paper reports a study of the roles of visuo-spatial and verbal workingmemory capacities in solving a planning task - the five-disc Tower of London (TOL) task. An individual differences approach was taken. Sixty adult participants were tested on 20 TOL tasks of varying difficulty. Total moves over the 20 TOL tasks was taken as a measure of performance. Participants were also assessed on measures of fluid intelligence (Raven's matrices), verbal short-term storage (Digit span), verbal working (...)memory span (Silly Sentence span), visuo-spatial short-term storage (Visual Pattern span and Corsi Block span), visuo-spatial workingmemory (Corsi Distance Estimation), visuo-spatial processing speed (Manikin test), and verbal speed (Rehearsal speed). Exploratory factor analysis using an oblique rotation method revealed three factors which were interpreted as (1) a visuo-spatial workingmemory factor, (2) an age-speed factor, and (3) a verbal workingmemory factor. The visuo-spatial and verbal factors were only moderately correlated. Performance on the TOL task loaded on the visuo-spatial factor but did not load on the other factors. It is concluded that the predominant goal-selection strategy adopted in solving the TOL relies on visuo-spatial workingmemory capacity and particularly involves the active ''inner scribe'' spatial rehearsal mechanism. These correlational analyses confirm and extend results previously obtained by use of dual task methods, (Phillips, Wynn, Gilhooly, Della Sala, & Logie, 1999). (shrink)
In the verbal domain, there is only very weak evidence favoring the view that workingmemory is an active state of long-term memory. We strengthen existing evidence by reviewing two recent fMRI studies of verbal workingmemory, which clearly demonstrate activation in the superior temporal lobe, a region known to be involved in processing speech during comprehension tasks.
activity” has been considered to play a major role in the short-term maintenance of memories. Many studies since then have provided support for this view and greatly advanced our knowledge of the effects of stimulus type and modality on delay activity and its temporal dynamics (Funahashi et al., 1993; Fuster et al., 2000; Romo et al., 1999). In humans, workingmemory has also been a subject of intense investigation using scalp and intracranial electroencephalography (EEG, iEEG) as well as (...) magnetoencephalography (MEG), which provide estimates of local population activity. The published findings include reports of systematic changes in signal amplitude during workingmemory in the theta (Raghavachari et al., 2001; Tesche and <span class='Hi'>Karhu</span>, 2000), alpha (Gevins et al., 1997; Workingmemory has been linked to elevated single Jensen et al., 2002), beta (Tallon-Baudry et al., 1999). (shrink)
O'Regan & Noë's (O&N's) theoretical framework for studying visual perception and awareness is intriguing. This framework, based on sensorimotor contingency, can be examined in recent visual brain theories using neuroimaging methodologies. Here, I consider how a workingmemory (WM) system explains the sensorimotor account of visual consciousness. I believe WM inside the brain provides at least partial support for O&N's theory.
Caplan & Waters argue that the processing resources used for sentence comprehension are not drawn from an undifferentiated verbal workingmemory resource. This commentary cites data from normal aging to support this position. Still lacking in theory development is a specification of the transient memory representations necessary for interpretive and post-interpretive operations.
Two experiments examined the contribution of workingmemory (WM) to the retrieval and inhibition of background knowledge about counterexamples (alternatives and disablers, Cummins, 1995) during conditional reasoning. Experiment 1 presented a conditional reasoning task with everyday, causal conditionals to a group of people with high and low WM spans. High spans rejected the logically invalid AC and DA inferences to a greater extent than low spans, whereas low spans accepted the logically valid MP and MT inferences less frequently (...) than high spans. In Experiment 2, an executive-attention-demanding secondary task was imposed during the reasoning task. Findings corroborate that WM resources are used for retrieval of stored counterexamples and that people with high WM spans will use WM resources to inhibit the counterexample activation when the type of counterexample conflicts with the logical validity of the reasoning problem. (shrink)
Individuals may differ in the general-attention executive component or in the subordinate domain-specific “slave” components of workingmemory. Tasks requiring sustained memory representations across attention shifts are reliable, valid indices of executive abilities. Measures emphasizing specific processing skills may increase reliability within restricted samples but will not reflect the attention component responsible for the broad predictive validity of span tasks.
Ruchkin et al.'s view of workingmemory as activated long-term memory is more compatible with language processing than models such as Baddeley's, but it raises questions about individual differences in workingmemory and the validity of domain-general capacity estimates. Does it make sense to refer to someone as having low workingmemory capacity if capacity depends on particular knowledge structures tapped by the task?
A promising approach to more refined models consistent with the Caplan & Waters hypothesis is based on similarity-based interference, a general principle that applies across workingmemory domains. This may explain both the fine details of syntactic workingmemory phenomena and the gross fractionation for which Caplan & Waters have found evidence. Detailed models of syntactic processing that embody similarity-based interference fare well cross-linguistically.
Glenberg focuses on conceptualizations that change from moment to moment, yet he dismisses the concept of workingmemory (sect. 4.3), which offers an account of temporary storage and on-line cognition. This commentary questions whether Glenberg's account adequately caters for observations of consistent data patterns in temporary storage of verbal and visuospatial information in healthy adults and in brain-damaged patients with deficits in temporary retention.
Workingmemory has been one of the most intensively studied systems in cognitive psychology. It is only relatively recently however that researchers have been able to study the neural processes might underlie workingmemory, leading to a proliferation of research in this domain. -/- The Cognitive Neuroscience of WorkingMemory brings together leading researchers from around the world to summarize current knowledge of this field, and directions for future research. An historical opening chapter by (...) Alan Baddeley and Graham Hitch sets the context for the subsequent chapters. The scope of the book is exceptionally broad, providing a showcase for cutting edge research on all contemporary concepts of workingmemory, using techniques from experimental psychology, single cell recording, neuropsychology, cognitive neuroimaging and computational modelling. -/- The Cognitive Neuroscience of WorkingMemory will be an important reference text for all those seeking an authoritative and comprehensive synthesis of this field. (shrink)
Caplan & Waters propose a dedicated linguistic workingmemory to handle “interpretive” language comprehension, but there are data suggesting that more general workingmemory capacity can predict syntactic comprehension difficulty, and their claims depend on the existence of a principled distinction between “interpretive” and “post-interpretive” processes, which seems unlikely. Other conceptions of the source of individual differences also deserve consideration, as more flexible explanations of the phenomena.
We propose that Bloom's focus on cognitive factors involved in word learning still lacks a broader perspective. We emphasize the crucial relevance of workingmemory in learning elements of language. Specifically, we demonstrate through our data that in impaired populations knowledge of some linguistic elements can be dissociated according to the subcomponent of workingmemory (visual or verbal) involved in a task. Further, although Bloom's concentration on theory of mind as a precondition for word learning is (...) certainly correct, theory of mind being a necessary condition does not make it a sufficient one. On the basis of our studies we point out the importance of a theory of mind related goal preference in acquiring spatial language. In general, we claim that more specific cognitive preferences and constraints should be outlined in detail for the preconditions of acquiring linguistic elements. (shrink)
The identity of working-memory and long-term memory representations follows from many lines of evidence. However, the data provided by Ruchkin et al. are hardly compelling, as they make unproved assumptions about hypothetical generators. We cite studies from our lab in which congruent slow-wave topographies were found for short-term and long-term memory tasks, strongly suggesting that both activate identical cell assemblies.
Attentional processes that operate on the contents of memory to produce the activation that is described as workingmemory by Ruchkin et al. and others, involve a network of brain regions that include both prefrontal and parietal sites. This network appears to mimic the one that is activated by attentional processes that operate on information entering via the senses.
The view that posterior brain systems engaged in lower-order perceptual functions are activated during sustained retention is challenged by fMRI data, which show consistent retention-related activation of higher-order memory representations for a variety of working-memory materials. Sustained retention entails the dynamic link of these higher-order memories with schemata for goal-oriented action housed by the frontal lobes.
The metric devised by Halford, Wilson & Phillips may have considerable potential in distinguishing between the workingmemory demands of different tasks but may be less effective in distinguishing workingmemory capacity between individuals. Despite the strengths of the metric, determining whether an effect is caused by relational complexity or by differential levels of expertise is currently problematic.
As revealed by standard neuropsychological testing, patients with damage either to the frontal lobe or to the hippocampus suffer from distinct impairments of workingmemory. It is unclear how Ruchkin et al.'s model integrates the role played by the hippocampus.
Caplan & Waters's model differentiating levels of processing and the role of workingmemory is important and likely right. However, their claim rests on a lack of correlation between workingmemory and structural complexity. We examine sources of variability in these measures that remain unaccounted for (by anyone), variability that muddies a straightforward claim that the lack of correlation is cleanly established.
'WorkingMemory, Thought, and Action' is the magnum opus of one of the most influential cognitive psychologists of the past 50 years. This new volume on the model he created (with Graham Hitch) discusses the developments that have occurred within the model in the past twenty years, and places it within a broader context. -/- Workingmemory is a temporary storage system that underpins our capacity for coherent thought. Some 30 years ago, Baddeley and Hitch proposed (...) a way of thinking about workingmemory that has proved to be both valuable and influential in its application to practical problems. This book updates the theory, discussing both the evidence in its favour, and alternative approaches. In addition, it discusses the implications of the model for understanding social and emotional behaviour, concluding with an attempt to place workingmemory in a broader biological and philosophical context. Inside are chapters on the phonological loop, the visuo-spatial sketchpad, the central executive and the episodic buffer. There are also chapters on the relevance to workingmemory of studies of the recency effect, of work based on individual differences, and of neuroimaging research. -/- The broader implications of the concept of workingmemory are discussed in the chapters on social psychology, anxiety, depression, consciousness and on the control of action. Finally, Baddeley discusses the relevance of a concept of workingmemory to the classic problems of consciousness and free will. -/- This new volume from one of the pioneers in memory research will doubtless emulate the success of its predecessor, and be a major publication within the psychological literature. (shrink)
Although the workingmemory capacity involved in syntactic processing may be separate from the capacity involved in word list recall, other aspects of initial sentence interpretation appear to depend on some of the same capacities tapped by span tasks. Specifically, there appears to a capacity for lexical–semantic retention involved in both sentence comprehension and span measures.
The goal of our target article is to establish that electrophysiological data constrain models of short-term memory retention operations to schemes in which activated long-term memory is its representational basis. The temporary stores correspond to neural circuits involved in the perception and subsequent processing of the relevant information, and do not involve specialized neural circuits dedicated to the temporary holding of information outside of those embedded in long-term memory. The commentaries ranged from general agreement with the view (...) that short-term memory stores correspond to activated long-term memory (e.g., Abry, Sato, Schwartz, Loevenbruck & Cathiard [Abry etal.], Cowan, Fuster, Grote, Hickok & Buchsbaum, Keenan, Hyönä & Kaakinen [Keenan et al.], Martin, Morra), to taking a definite exception to this view (e.g., Baddeley, Düzel, Logie & Della Sala, Kroger, Majerus, Van der Linden, Colette & Salmon [Majerus et al.], Vallar). (shrink)
This is a comment on Peter Carruthers' "On Central Cognition", both originally presented at the 2011 Oberlin Colloquium in Philosophy. The comment discusses workingmemory, attention and the global workspace, and empirical evidence from neuroscience that Carruthers' adduces to argue for the claim that central cognition is sensory based because only sensory systems have direct access to workingmemory and the global workspace. I raise some questions about the empirical evidence for this claim.
Cowan fails to obtain a magical number of 7 because his analysis is faulty. This is revealed by an alternative analysis of Cowan's own tasks. The analysis assumes a number 7 for adults, and neoPiagetian mental- capacity values for children. Data patterns and proportions of success (reported in Cowan's Figs. 2 and 3) are thus quantitatively explained in detail for the first time.
We compared the processing of natural language quantifiers in a group of patients with schizophrenia and a healthy control group. In both groups, the difficulty of the quantifiers was consistent with computational predictions, and patients with schizophrenia took more time to solve the problems. However, they were significantly less accurate only with proportional quantifiers, like more than half. This can be explained by noting that, according to the complexity perspective, only proportional quantifiers require workingmemory engagement.
Compared to truthful answers, deceptive responses to queries are expected to take longer to initiate. Yet attempts to detect lies through reaction time (RT) have met with limited success. We describe a new procedure that seems to increase the RT difference between truth-telling and lies. It relies on a Stroop-like procedure in which responses to the labels true and false are sometimes reversed. The utility of this method is assessed in a laboratory study involving both statements of fact and attitude. (...) Three different ethnic groups participated: Americans of European ancestry, East Asians, and native Arabic speakers. For all three groups, our technique allowed identification of prevarication reliably better than chance. (shrink)
Linguistic dependencies between non-adjacent words have been shown to cause comprehension difficulty, compared with local dependencies. According to one class of sentence comprehension accounts, non-local dependencies are difficult because they require the retrieval of the first dependent from memory when the second dependent is encountered. According to these memory-based accounts, making the first dependent accessible at the time when the second dependent is encountered should help alleviate the difficulty associated with the processing of non-local dependencies. In a dual-task (...) paradigm, participants read sentences that did or did not contain a non-local dependency (i.e., object- and subject-extracted cleft constructions) while simultaneously remembering a word. The memory task was aimed at making the word held in memory accessible throughout the sentence. In an object-extracted cleft (e.g., It was Ellen whom John consulted…), the object (Ellen) must be retrieved from memory when consulted is encountered. In the critical manipulation, the memory word was identical to the verb's object (ELLEN). In these conditions, the extraction effect was reduced in the comprehension accuracy data and eliminated in the reading time data. These results add to the body of evidence supporting memory-based accounts of syntactic complexity. (shrink)
We explore the interaction between oculomotor control and language comprehension on the sentence level using two well-tested computational accounts of parsing difficulty. Previous work (Boston, Hale, Vasishth, & Kliegl, 2011) has shown that surprisal (Hale, 2001; Levy, 2008) and cue-based memory retrieval (Lewis & Vasishth, 2005) are significant and complementary predictors of reading time in an eyetracking corpus. It remains an open question how the sentence processor interacts with oculomotor control. Using a simple linking hypothesis proposed in Reichle, Warren, (...) and McConnell (2009), we integrated both measures with the eye movement model EMMA (Salvucci, 2001) inside the cognitive architecture ACT-R (Anderson et al., 2004). We built a reading model that could initiate short “Time Out regressions” (Mitchell, Shen, Green, & Hodgson, 2008) that compensate for slow postlexical processing. This simple interaction enabled the model to predict the re-reading of words based on parsing difficulty. The model was evaluated in different configurations on the prediction of frequency effects on the Potsdam Sentence Corpus. The extension of EMMA with postlexical processing improved its predictions and reproduced re-reading rates and durations with a reasonable fit to the data. This demonstration, based on simple and independently motivated assumptions, serves as a foundational step toward a precise investigation of the interaction between high-level language processing and eye movement control. (shrink)
Miller (1956) summarized evidence that people can remember about seven chunks in short-term memory (STM) tasks. However, that number was meant more as a rough estimate and a rhetorical device than as a real capacity limit. Others have since suggested that there is a more precise capacity limit, but that it is only three to five chunks. The present target article brings together a wide variety of data on capacity limits suggesting that the smaller capacity limit is real. Capacity (...) limits will be useful in analyses of information processing only if the boundary conditions for observing them can be carefully described. Four basic conditions in which chunks can be identified and capacity limits can accordingly be observed are: (1) when information overload limits chunks to individual stimulus items, (2) when other steps are taken specifically to block the recoding of stimulus items into larger chunks, (3) in performance discontinuities caused by the capacity limit, and (4) in various indirect effects of the capacity limit. Under these conditions, rehearsal and long-term memory cannot be used to combine stimulus items into chunks of an unknown size; nor can storage mechanisms that are not capacity-limited, such as sensory memory, allow the capacity-limited storage mechanism to be refilled during recall. A single, central capacity limit averaging about four chunks is implicated along with other, noncapacity-limited sources. The pure STM capacity limit expressed in chunks is distinguished from compound STM limits obtained when the number of separately held chunks is unclear. Reasons why pure capacity estimates fall within a narrow range are discussed and a capacity limit for the focus of attention is proposed. Key Words: attention; enumeration; information chunks; memory capacity; processing capacity; processing channels; serial recall; short-term memory; storage capacity; verbal recall; workingmemory capacity. (shrink)
The aim of this article is to enquire into neuroscientific research on memory and relate it to topics of skill, knowledge and consciousness. The article outlines some contemporary theories on procedural and workingmemory, and discusses what contributions they give to sport science and philosophy of sport. It is argued that memory research gives important insights to the neuronal structures and events involved in knowledge and consciousness contributing to sport skills, but that these explanations are not (...) exhaustive. The article argues that phenomenal consciousness in skills is not explained by the neuroscience of memory, and hence neither are skills. (shrink)
This book explores the usefulness of major categories of Paul Ricoeur's work, such as "memory, " "narrativity, " and his conception of self, within different ...
One of the fundamental questions raised by Ruchkin, Grafman, Cameron, and Berndt's (Ruchkin et al.'s) interpretation of no distinct specialized neural networks for short-term storage buffers and long-term memory systems, is that of the link between perception and memory processes. In this framework, we take the opportunity in this commentary to discuss a specific workingmemory task involving percept formation, temporary retention, auditory imagery, and the attention-based maintenance of information, that is, the verbal transformation effect.
Ruchkin et al. ascribe a pivotal role to long-term memory representations and binding within workingmemory. Here we focus on the interaction of workingmemory and long-term memory in supporting on-line representations of experience available to guide on-going processing, and we distinguish the role of frontal-lobe systems from what the hippocampus contributes to relational long-term memory binding.
The limited capacity for unrelated things is a fact that needs to be explained by a general theory of memory, rather than being itself used as a means of explaining data. A pure storage capacity is therefore not the right assumption for memory research. Instead an explanation is needed of how capacity limitations arise from the interaction between the environment and the cognitive system. The ACT-R architecture, a theory without workingmemory but a long-term memory (...) based on activation, may provide such an explanation. (shrink)
With reference to Ruchkins et al.'s framework, this commentary briefly considers the history of workingmemory, and whether, heuristically, this is a useful concept. A neuropsychologically motivated critique is offered, specifically with regard to the recent trend for working-memory researchers to conceptualise this capacity more as a process than as a set of distinct task-specific stores.
Cowan has written a meticulous and thought-provoking review of the literature on short-term memory. However, reflections on one area of evidence, that of workingmemory span, shows the extent to which the research debate can be circumscribed by choice of experimental paradigms.
We discuss the role of short-term auditory verbal storage within a workingmemory system. Data from single case studies of patients with left parietal lesions and selective impairment of memory span are discussed in order to address the question of the functions of short-term memory in language processing. The backup resource of auditory verbal short-term memory is required for those tasks that necessitate backtracking in order to integrate a verbal message within a developing central cognitive (...) representation. (shrink)
What is encoded in workingmemory may be a content-addressable pointer, but a critical portion of the information that is addressed includes the motor information to achieve deictic reference in the environment. Additionally, the same strategy that is used to access environment information just in time for its use may also be used to access long-term memory via the pre-frontal cortex.
Looking is a fundamental exploratory behavior by which infants acquire knowledge about the world. In theories of infant habituation, however, looking as an exploratory behavior has been deemphasized relative to the reliable nature with which looking indexes active cognitive processing. We present a new theory that connects looking to the dynamics of memory formation and formally implement this theory in a Dynamic Neural Field model that learns autonomously as it actively looks and looks away from a stimulus. We situate (...) this model in a habituation task and illustrate the mechanisms by which looking, encoding, workingmemory formation, and long-term memory formation give rise to habituation across multiple stimulus and task contexts. We also illustrate how the act of looking and the temporal dynamics of learning affect each other. Finally, we test a new hypothesis about the sources of developmental differences in looking. (shrink)
A monumental work by an important modern philosopher, Matter and Memory (1896) represents one of the great inquiries into perception and memory, movement and time, matter and mind. Nobel Prize-winner Henri Bergson surveys these independent but related spheres, exploring the connection of mind and body to individual freedom of choice. Bergson’s efforts to reconcile the facts of biology to a theory of consciousness offered a challenge to the mechanistic view of nature, and his original and innovative views exercised (...) a profound influence on other philosophers--including James, Whitehead, and Santayana--as well as novelists such as Dos Passos and Proust. Matter and Memory is essential to an understanding of Bergson’s philosophy and its legacy. (shrink)
This paper surveys the impact on neuropsychology of Wittgenstein's elucidations of memory. Wittgenstein discredited the storage and imprint models of memory, dissolved the conceptual link between memory and mental images or representations and, upholding the context-sensitivity of memory, made room for a family resemblance concept of memory, where remembering can also amount to doing or saying something. While neuropsychology is still generally under the spell of archival and physiological notions of memory, Wittgenstein's reconceptions can (...) be seen at work in its leading-edge practitioners. However, neuroscientists, generally, are finding memory difficult to demarcate from other cognitive and noncognitive processes, and I suggest this is largely due to their considering automatic responses as part of memory, termed nondeclarative or implicit memory. Taking my lead from Wittgenstein's On Certainty, I argue that there is only remembering where there is also some kind of mnemonic effort or attention, and, therefore, that so-called implicit memory is not memory at all, but a basic, noncognitive certainty. (shrink)
