Research on working memory model

What did Braver (1997) find about the central executive?

Brain scans showed increased activity in the prefrontal cortex as task difficulty increased, providing biological evidence for the central executive.

What did Baddeley (1996) find about dual-task performance?

Participants performed worse when generating random numbers while switching between typing numbers and letters, suggesting the central executive has limited capacity.

How can central executive research be applied to real life?

Driving while talking can reduce performance in both tasks due to limited central executive capacity, increasing risk.

Why might the driving application be limited?

Experienced drivers rely on automatic processing, so the central executive is less involved, meaning dual-task interference may be reduced.

What did Klauer and Zhao (2004) find about the visuospatial sketchpad?

Spatial tasks were more disrupted by spatial interference than visual interference, suggesting separate visual and spatial components.

What do case studies (SC, KF) show about the visuospatial sketchpad?

Brain-damaged patients had impaired phonological loops but intact visuospatial sketchpads, showing these are separate systems.

What is the word length effect?

Shorter words are recalled better than longer words because they take less time to rehearse within the phonological loop.

What did Baddeley (1975) find?

Participants recalled more monosyllabic words than polysyllabic words, supporting the idea that the phonological loop has a limited time-based capacity (~2 seconds).

What do case studies (Trojani & Grossi; KF) show about the phonological loop?

Brain damage can impair auditory memory but leave visual memory intact, supporting separate components in working memory.

What did Prabhakaran et al. (2000) investigate?

They studied how the brain processes integrated vs separate spatial and verbal information using fMRI scans.

What did Prabhakaran et al. (2000) find?

Greater activation in the prefrontal cortex occurred when information was integrated, suggesting the episodic buffer combines information.

What does this suggest about the episodic buffer?

It may be located in the prefrontal cortex and is responsible for integrating different types of information.