Abstract
The importance of working memory (WM) in reading and mathematics performance has been widely studied, with recent research examining the components of WM (i.e., storage and processing) and their roles in these educational outcomes. However, the differing relationships between these abilities and the foundational skills involved in the development of reading and mathematics have received less attention. Additionally, the separation of verbal, visual and spatial storage and processing and subsequent links with foundational skills and downstream reading and mathematics has not been widely examined. The current study investigated the separate contributions of processing and storage from verbal, visual and spatial tasks to reading and mathematics, whilst considering influences on the underlying skills of verbal comprehension and counting, respectively. Ninety-two children aged 7- to 8-years were assessed. It was found that verbal comprehension (with some caveats) was predicted by verbal storage and reading was predicted by verbal and spatial storage. Counting was predicted by visual processing and storage, whilst mathematics was related to verbal and spatial storage. We argue that resources for tasks relying on external representations of stimuli related mainly to storage, and were largely verbal and spatial in nature. When a task required internal representation, there was a draw on visual processing and storage abilities. Findings suggest a possible meaningful separability of types of processing. Further investigation of this could lead to the development of an enhanced WM model, which might better inform interventions and reasonable adjustments for children who struggle with reading and mathematics due to WM deficits.
Highlights
Working memory (WM) is commonly defined as the ability to process information and maintain it for short periods of time, in the pursuit of a known goal (Baddeley and Hitch, 1974; Cowan, 1999; Cowan et al, 2005; Henry et al, 2012)
Working Memory, Reading and Mathematics that is processed and stored in terms of its location and/or visual characteristics), studies have shown that primary school-age children demonstrate marked increases in the quantity of and the length of time that information can be stored in working memory (WM)
There is evidence that visual WM capacity doubles between the ages of 5 years and 10 years (Riggs et al, 2006), and the ability to hold verbal information in WM for longer periods of time might be attributed to the emergence of verbal rehearsal in 7- to 8-year-olds (Henry and Millar, 1993; but see Jarrold and Citroën, 2013)
Summary
Working memory (WM) is commonly defined as the ability to process information and maintain it for short periods of time, in the pursuit of a known goal (Baddeley and Hitch, 1974; Cowan, 1999; Cowan et al, 2005; Henry et al, 2012). Increases in WM ability occur with the use of maintenance strategies which prolong the duration over which information can be maintained These include verbal rehearsal of phonological information (Baddeley, 1996) and image generation for visuospatial information (Logie, 1995). The time-based resource-sharing (TBRS) model (Barrouillet et al, 2004) argues that an ability to rapidly switch attention between items being processed and items being remembered is fundamental to WM. According to this model, increases in WM capacity are explained by faster processing speeds allowing for more opportunities to refresh items to be remembered. Cowan and colleagues argue that increased, effortful attentional abilities to process salient information is the fundamental component of efficient WM
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