Relation Between Working Memory Capacity of Biological Movements and Fluid Intelligence.

Tian Ye,Quan Gu,Peng Li,Zaifeng Gao,Qiong Zhang,Xiqian Lu,Mowei Shen

doi:10.3389/fpsyg.2019.02313

Abstract

Studies have revealed that there is an independent buffer for holding biological movements (BM) in working memory (WM), and this BM-WM has a unique link to our social ability. However, it remains unknown as to whether the BM-WM also correlates to our cognitive abilities, such as fluid intelligence (Gf). Since BM processing has been considered as a hallmark of social cognition, which distinguishes from canonical cognitive abilities in many ways, it has been hypothesized that only canonical object-WM (e.g., memorizing color patches), but not BM-WM, emerges to have an intimate relation with Gf. We tested this prediction by measuring the relationship between WM capacity of BM and Gf. With two Gf measurements, we consistently found moderate correlations between BM-WM capacity, the score of both Raven’s advanced progressive matrix (RAPM), and the Cattell culture fair intelligence test (CCFIT). This result revealed, for the first time, a close relation between WM and Gf with a social stimulus, and challenged the double-dissociation hypothesis for distinct functions of different WM buffers.

Highlights

Biological movements (BMs) refer to the movements of animate entities (Johansson, 1973)
Results of our pilot study revealed a significant correlation between BM-working memory (WM) capacity and Gf, suggesting that the performance of BM-WM can predict one’s cognitive ability
The goal of our study was to examine whether BM-WM capacity can predict canonical cognitive ability

Summary

Introduction

Biological movements (BMs) refer to the movements of animate entities (Johansson, 1973). Previous studies explored the BM-WM mechanisms by using real human movements (Smyth et al, 1988; Smyth and Pendleton, 1990; Wu and Coulson, 2014), computer-generated animations of human movements (Wood, 2007, 2011), imaginary BMs by the given names (Cortese and Rossi-Arnaud, 2010), and point light displays (PLDs) of human movements (Shen et al, 2014; Liu et al, 2019). Recent studies have begun to explore issues such as the development of BM-WM (He et al, 2019), the influence of other social information (e.g., social interaction and emotion) on BMWM capacity (Ding et al, 2017; Guo et al, 2019), BM-related binding in WM (Wood, 2008; Poom, 2012; Ding et al, 2015; Gu et al, 2019), the representation format of BM in WM (Vicary and Stevens, 2014; Vicary et al, 2014), and the frame of reference for remembering BM (Wood, 2010)

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Conclusion