Developmental changes in speech rate and memory span: A causal relationship?

Abstract

Previous experiments concerned with the development of serial recall have shown a close relationship between increases in speech rate and increases in recall. The same linear function relating recall to speech rate fits the results of subjects of widely differing ages, increases in recall being accompanied by corresponding increases in speech rate. To test the idea that increases in speech rate are a cause of increases in recall two experiments were conducted in which children were trained to increase their speech rate. Small increases in speech rate were accompanied by corresponding increases in recall, but these changes were not reliably greater than those found in children exposed to the words involved but not explicitly trained to speak faster.