Psychological Sciences researchers delve into our working memory
psychologists’ basic research has several educational applications

A child’s ability to comprehend a concept depends on his or her mental capacity, which is a subject of interest to parents, teachers and child psychologists. They want to know a child’s ability to understand multiple tasks at once. They want to know how many elements can be combined for a child to understand an idea. Researchers at the University of Missouri-Columbia are studying human "working" memory as a means to measure mental capacity.

Nelson Cowan, professor of Psychological Sciences, and Scott Saults, a psychology research associate, have recently published the results of their studies on working memory in the Journal of Experimental Psychology and Advances in Child Development and Behavior. Cowan said "working" memory means different things to different researchers, but an accepted, general definition is the small amount of information that humans hold in mind to complete a mental task.

Experiments were designed to determine how well a child can store and process auditory and visual stimuli simultaneously. For example, in one experiment, subjects were asked to try to remember color patterns displayed on a computer monitor while a computerized voice spoke a series of numbers. In another experiment, the researchers asked how many numbers subjects could remember after a long series of digits were spoken. In short, the tasks required the subjects to focus on more than one task.

Cowan said it has always been difficult to determine how many chunks of information humans can hold in mind, because it has not been clear how the information is grouped within one’s mind. By using test situations in which there is no opportunity to group items together, the researchers found that adults can retain on average about four chunks in the focus of attention, and children can retain fewer–two to two-and-a-half chunks for first-grade children, for example.

"We’re asking ourselves, ‘what is the general principle of what people keep in mind and what are the limits?’" Cowan said. "With children, it’s hard to pin down why they retain certain things. We know they can focus their attention on a variety of subjects, but there seems to be a limit to how much they can attend to. It is important to be able to focus attention concurrently on multiple chunks of information that often have to be combined in order to form a new concept."

Cowan and Saults believe their work contributes critical information on human cognitive processes. Saults says their findings have practical applications. The research may help educators develop a general understanding of how much capacity for information children have. Of course, each child is unique, but general assumptions could emerge from the researchers’ findings. In other words, as Saults explains, the research could help predict the point at which children reach their quota of stimuli in the effort to absorb the elements used to explain an idea or concept. Saults emphasizes that fortifying teachers with this information could help them develop appropriate curriculum, establish the right educational environment or accurately diagnose learning difficulties.

In collaborative work with other investigators, the researchers have also applied working memory experiments to children with language disorders and to schizophrenic patients. The researchers found that children with language disorders have trouble remembering the serial order of items specifically. Schizophrenic patients have trouble forming precise mental representations of tones.

Cowan’s research on the working memory of children has been sponsored by the National Institutes of Health since 1984. Cowan is also one the few MU researchers who has earned an honorary doctorate; this summer he received an honorary degree from Helsinki University. The degree is the highest honor bestowed by the university. The ceremony continued an academic tradition that began in the 1600s.

Additional links:

Nelson Cowan
Scott Saults
Department of Psychological Sciences

Children's safety around cars organization: www.4rkidssake.org

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