142 • CHAPTER 5 Short-Term and Working Memory
holding the last word in each sentence in memory. This method is illustrated in the fol-
lowing Methods section.METHOD Reading Span
Reading span is measured as follows (try it!). Read the fi rst sentence below out loud (impor-
tant!), then cover the sentence and remember the last word in the sentence. Then read the
second sentence out loud, cover it, remember the last word, and fi nally read the third sentence.
After reading the third sentence, indicate what the three last words in the sentences were,
in order.When at last his eyes opened, there was no gleam of triumph, no shade of anger.
The taxi turned up Michigan Avenue, where they had a clear view of the lake.
After he got out of the car, he began walking rapidly toward the bus station.In Daneman and Carpenter’s experiment, reading span was measured by determining how many
sentences a person could read and then successfully repeat the last words in order.Daneman and Carpenter measured reading spans for 20 participants and also
presented a comprehension test in which participants answered a question about
a paragraph they had read. When they compared reading spans and performance
on the comprehension test, they found that participants with larger reading spans
performed better on the comprehension test. The fi ve readers with a reading span
of 2 correctly answered an average of 13.6 out of 24 questions, but the six readers
with spans of 4 and 5 answered 19.7 of the 24 questions. Reading span was also
related to the participants’ verbal SAT scores, with larger spans being associated
with higher scores.
Many other experiments have obtained similar results, showing that better work-
ing memory scores are associated with better comprehension and also with better
reasoning ability and higher intelligence (Conway et al., 2003). One idea about what
this means is that people with better working memory capacity score better on these
tests because there is more space in their working memory to hold and manipulate
information. But another idea is that a person’s working memory capacity refl ects not
only how many items can be stored, but how effi ciently the person can focus attention
on relevant information and fi lter out irrelevant information (Awh & Vogel, 2008;
McNab & Klingberg, 2008). If this sounds familiar, it is because this is the result of
the Vogel et al. (2005) event-related potential experiment we described earlier (see
Figure 5.28).
Thus, we end this chapter with the message that opened our discussion of working
memory on page 130: The important characteristic of working memory is not just how
much space there is in it, but how it manipulates information. The relation between
memory and our interactions in the world is captured best by considering the dynamic
properties of memory. In the three chapters that follow, we will see that this is also true
for long-term memory.- The physiology of working memory has been studied using (a) brain lesions in
monkeys, (b) neural recording from monkeys, and (c) brain imaging and event-
related potential recording experiments in humans. What do the results of each
of these procedures tell us about working memory and the brain? - What is the reading span task? Why is it a better test of working memory than
the digit span task? - What is the evidence supporting the idea that better comprehension, reason-
ing, and intelligence are related to having a larger and more effi cient working
memory?
TEST YOURSELF 5.3
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