WORKING MEMORY

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'andGrahamHitch'UNIVERSITYOFSTIRLING,STI RLING, } ,TransfertoLTS, }' decadeofintensiveresearchonthetopicofsho rt-termmemory(STM), ,ofcourse, (STS)-thehypotheticalmemorysystemwhichis assumedtoberesponsibleforperformanceinta sksinvolvingshort-termmemoryparadigms(At kinson&Shiffrin,1968)-hasbeenas-signeda crucialroleintheperformanceofawiderangeo ftasksincludingproblemsolving(Hunter,196 4),languagecomprehension(Rumelhart,Linds ay,&Norman,1972)andmostnotably,long-term learning(Atkinson&Shiffrin,1968;Waugh&No rman,1965).Per-hapsthemostcogentcasefort hecentralimportanceofSTSingen-eralinform ationprocessingisthatofAtkinsonandShiffr in(1971) ,despitethefrequencywithwhichSTS1 , 'Vorkin~Melllor}'49hasbeenassignedthisro leasanoperationalorworkingmemory,theempi ricalevidenceforsucha 'sgeneralprocessingca-pacity,asreRectedb yhisperformanceonsomesimultaneoussub-sid iarytask,suchascardsorting(Murdock,1965) ,trackingper-formance(Martin,1970),orrea ctiontimeOohnston,Griffith&Wagstaff,1972 ).

50 Alan D. naddd~) and Grah'lIlt Hitch Working ~Iellloq 51 Memory load Method of reading Zero I-letter 2-1etters Silent 3.07 3.35 Aloud 3.21 3.33 3.26 3.41 Means 3.20 3.31 3.31 TABLE [MEAN TIME (SEC) TO COMPLETE VERBAL REASONING PROBLEMS AS A FUNCTION OF SIZE OF ADDITIONAL MEMORY LoAD AND METHOD OF READING MEMORY ITEMS j. Experiment …

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