Annotated Bibliography: Working Memory Capacity and Interleaving
Topic: Working Memory Capacity and Interleaving
Carpenter, S. K., & Mueller, F. E. (2013). The effects of interleaving versus blocking on foreign language pronunciation learning. Memory & Cognition, 41(5), 671–682. doi:10.3758/s13421-012-0291-4
The authors of this article demonstrate that interleaved practice or interleaving has significant benefits over blocking. Thus, this method enables students to alternate between different competencies which are intended to be learned during training. The literature is also attempting to make different estimations as to whether interleaving can enhance learning in the existing body of research. From this study, it is clear that blocked practice has the potential of improving verbal learning. Carpenter and Muller (2013) conducted four experiments on college students in which they were learning French pronunciation guidelines utilizing interleaving. In these trials, a handful of rubrics are represented on sequential practice experiments. These practice tests are clustered according to the set rules. Across the four trials, the authors attempt to demonstrate that individuals who are not speakers of French are capable of learning orthographic-to-phonological calibration in the language. Comprehensive results show the restriction of interleaving. Carpenter and Muller (2013) want this study to assist in conducting further research into when the approach is useful.
Carvalho, P. F., & Goldstone, R. L. (2017). The sequence of study changes what information is attended to, encoded, and remembered during category learning. Journal of Experimental Psychology-Learning Memory and Cognition, 43(11), 1699-1719. doi:10.1037/xlm0000406
Carvalho and Goldstone (2017) report that the impact of different sequences on learning efficiency is not associated with the sequence intrinsically. Instead, it is related to the outcomes that sequencing has on a nonspecific study activity. The authors give an interpretation of why the sequence of study influences learning might project different results described in the research evidence. It also assists in guiding instructors, students, as well as learning intellectuals on choosing which sequence to utilize. The article makes an original contribution to the available volume of research by using the results to offer support for the Sequential Attention Theory (SAT), which postulates that interleaved and blocked techniques underscore a host of factors of the learning content or context. Thus, when students are being taught, they relate the current items to the initially learned one. The researchers also demonstrate evidence for this process across different experiments. The study concludes by stating that the SAT can make various estimations regarding variables that should modulate the utility of interleaved and blocked techniques.
Cokely, E. T., Kelley, C. M., & Gilchrist, A. L. (2006). Sources of individual differences in working memory: Contributions of strategy to capacity. Psychonomic Bulletin & Review, 13(6), 991-7. Retrieved from https://link.springer.com/content/pdf/10.3758/BF03213914.pdf
The authors have conducted a series of laboratory tests to probe whether attentional control causes heightened interference. The authors also attempt to demonstrate that strategy selection plays a vital role in explaining performance disparities between respondents with working memory (WM) capacity. There is a hypothetical basis provided for this study. Cokely et al. (2007), theorize that personal discrepancies in attentional regulation are not only differences in the ability to manage concentration but might be caused by the connection between WM and strategy utilization. The article fills the gap in literature because it demonstrates that whereas under high cognitive load, WM capacity respondents are often negatively affected than low MW (LMW) individuals. This is because LMW capacity subjects depend less on the complex as well as active strategy utilization. Overall, the study proposes a connection between strategy use and WM capacity.
Daily, L. Z., Lovett, M. C., Reder, L. M. (2001). Modeling individual differences in working memory performance: A source activation account. Cognitive Science, 25(3), 315-353.
Daily et al. start by describing working memory as the quantity of data that could be organized at once, including both oral and spatial data. In this article, the authors’ primary focus is to probe a model to determine the WM effect of individual participants by conducting two laboratory studies. The research findings show that the benefit of having a model’s detailed behaviors at hand is that it helps scientists to analyze a respondents behavior. Most importantly, it allows them separate behavior into different segments that the model can interpret and those it cannot. In doing so, it facilitates the process of establishing irregular reports. The authors also attempt to elaborate on how a well-developed and specified model can be employed to categorize participants by their attributes and qualities. As a consequence, this provides an account of individual disparities in WM performance. However, there is no theoretical basis provided for this study.
Delaney, P. F., & Sahakyan, L. (2007). Unexpected costs of high working memory capacity following directed forgetting and contextual change manipulations. Memory & Cognition, 35(5), 1074-82. Retrieved from http://citeseerx.ist.psu.edu/viewdoc/download?doi=10.1.1.306.4100&rep=rep1&type=pdf
The authors of this article conducted a series of laboratory studies to determine whether working memory capacity (WMC) modulated forgetting effects. The study also offers different theoretical basis. The first one is that LWM respondents are less likely to associate contextual data to learned items as effectively as HWM individuals. The second hypothesis is that both HWM and LWM participants depends on qualitatively various techniques while studying and retrieving items that were previously learned. However, the authors have taken into context that LWM people cannot be interrupted by contextual shifts because they do not focus on the background. Instead, they learn items in a manner that minimizes the use of context during the retrieval process. The conclusions of the study are justified by the results, which show that specific types of interruptions could be more disruptive for HWM respondents than LWM individuals. Besides, the authors have demonstrated that WMC also facilitates the directed forgetting effect.
Firth, J., Rivers, I., & Boyle, J. (2019). A systematic review of interleaving as a concept learning strategy. Social Science Protocols, 2, 1-7.
Firth an others begin this section by outlining the methodology of a systematic review of the study into the employment of interleaving as a concept of learning strategy. Research also proved the direct correlation between interleaving and spacing effect. The authors have also focused their attention on the fact that interleaving items inevitably improves the gaps between one example item and the one previously learned. The authors have presented a systematic review of research evidence from different databases between 2008 to present. The study is written from an academic school of thought. The limitation of the study was the potential research biases. However, the authors have used meta-analysis to minize the bias resulting from studies with small sample size. The conclusion is justified by the findings that interleaving supports the contrast of everyday case studies and thus can be used as a concept learning strategy. Therefore, interleaving should be used as a component of evidence-based teaching practice.
Hall, D., Jarrold, C., Towse, J. N., & Zarandi, A. L. (2015). The developmental influence of primary memory capacity on working memory and academic achievement. Developmental Psychology, 51(8), 1131-1147. doi:10.1037/a0039464
The authors set out by first defining WM as the ability to process data while engaging in another cognitive function at the same time. The study also explores the development of primary memory ability in children. The authors have also mapped multiple tasks against traditional gauges of the facile and sophisticated span. The article also observes age-based shifts with the primary memory approximations.. The findings reveal the occurrence of evident individual disparities in primary memory capacity (PMC). However, all novel measures were analytical of simple span performance. The study concludes that PMC develops as children become older. Thus, there is indisputable evidence that memory is a great pointer of excellent academic achievement by primary school students. However, Hall et al. (2015) postulate that this does not take place among older children because the predictive influence of this factor wanes at approximately the age of twelve.
Lin, C.-H. (Janice), Chiang, M.-C., Wu, A. D., Iacoboni, M., Udompholkul, P., Yazdanshenas, O., & Knowlton, B. J. (2012). Age related differences in the neural substrates of motor sequence learning after interleaved and repetitive practice. NeuroImage, 62(3), 2007–2020. doi:10.1016/j.neuroimage.2012.05.015
The authors want to understand how aging affects neuroplasticity when competencies are fostered under diverse practice situations. The study has interrelated behaviourally appropriate BOLD signal shifts as well as cortical hypersensitivity to explore the impact of aging on coexisting learning-based adjustments at a hemodynamic system phase and in the motor cortex. The authors do not discuss any research theory. The research questions were well framed and hypothesized that the interleaved method of sequence leads to neural process compared to the recurrent technique in the elderly. It also states that neural activity during the interleaving process results in improved learning outcomes and that aging moderates this relationship. The sample size was small because it only had 32 participants. The article concludes that a behavioral model with higher temporal resolution can determine the aging effect on skills developments by partitioning the portion of the task activity, such as encoding and retrieval. The authors also conclude that in the future is that it will be possible to align the physiological effects of aging with shifts within the architecture of neuroplasticity.
Maddox, G. B., Balota, D. A., Kumar, A. A., Millar, P. R., & Churchill, L. (2019). The immediate benefits and long-term consequences of briefly presented masked primes on episodic recollection. Journal of Memory & Language, 106, 77-94
The purpose of this study was to explore whether an individual can enhance the activation of stored recollection tracks for memory-related retrieval with short masked primes represented adjacent to the threshold of discernment. The article fills a gap in literature because it focuses on extending the lexical/semantic priming to activities that constitute explicit retrieval by utilizing a cued recall laboratory trail instead of a recognition experiment. The sample size is small because it involves only 32 participants, and it could have been longer. The article would be suitable for future research as it goes into detail regarding the different types of priming data that lead to distinct effects in pronunciation, and the orthographic-to-phonological mappings of language. The authors communicate well and thoroughly about activation and recollection. The study concludes that researchers could anticipate that diverse forms of primes might exert distinct influence in the process of retrieval at different episodes.
Oberauer, K., & Kliegl, R. (2006). A formal model of capacity limits in working memory. Journal of Memory and Language, 55(4), 601-626. doi://dx.doi.org.lopes.idm.oclc.org/10.1016/j.jml.2006.08.009
In this study, Oberauer and Kliegl propose a mathematical paradigm of WMC limit based on the primary supposition of shared interference between items in working memory. The authors also postulate that inference results from overwriting aspects shared by these items. The authors conduct multiple laboratory studies. The study uses a quantitative survey with a multi-level regression approach. This methodology is used to manage data in which the times of quantifications differ from subject to subject. The findings of the research evidence demonstrate, for instance, that trial situation that has lower working memory requirements for a single operation leads to a reduction in general-purpose processing competencies. The study concludes that WMC is limited by mutual interference among the objects held available at once. Thus, effective implementations of the interference paradigm can provide scientists with the opportunity to make certain estimations resulting from a variety of ways where elements interact. In addition, this contact leads to the capacity limit of WM.
Roediger III, H. L. (2013). Applying cognitive psychology to education: Translational educational science. Psychological Science in the Public Interest, 14(1), 1-3. doi:10.1177/1529100612454415
According to the author of this study, education has failed to align itself with a medical model of evidence-based practice. Nonetheless, in recent years, this area has made fundamental improvements in using cognitive processes to education. This article reveals that the present findings in cognitive neuroscience psychology and education have sparked new interest in how learning occurs. Roediger (2013) further underscores the need for multidisciplinary cooperation to promote a new “science of learning.” The report also emphasizes that the need to improve students learning with practical approaches is a component of the tradition of taking stock the implications of further studies for educational practice. Thus, this practice can play an integral part in promoting a translational-driven education, which enables instructors to choose evidence-based teaching practices. The study concludes that educators should use effective learning techniques that should be implemented wherever possible. The author also concludes by stating that teachers should encourage students to use retrieval practice through testing.
Rohrer, D. (2012). Interleaving helps students distinguish among similar concepts. Educational Psychology Review, 24(3), 355
This article aim is to show that the efficacy of children’s learning takes place when they are assigned recurrent study phases in a manner that is interleave-related. It also reports the advantages associated with interleaving for additional kinds of cognitive and motor functions. Rohrer (2012) explains that the advantages accruded from interleaving support selective contrast among ideas that are frequently confused. Thus, interleaving focuses on promoting more practical retrieval technique than does blocking. The practice of continuous retrieval of category-driven data and labeling of new representation could be the core to the advantage of interleaving. Once a presentation is blocked, the extraction of previously studied objects illustrating a specific concept can be diminished since these presentations are still active in working memory. This article provides valuable background information that demonstrates the need to implement current research to educational practice because the loss can be higher with the body of higher-achievers in classrooms and schools.
Sana, F., Yan, V. X., Kim, J. A., Bjork, E. L., & Bjork, R. A. (2018). Does Working Memory Capacity Moderate the Interleaving Benefit? Journal of Applied Research in Memory and Cognition. Doi:10.1016/j.jarmac.2018.05.005.
This article demonstrates that working memory capacity (WMC) plays no significant part in the interleaving effect. The reports findings indicate that interleaving may oversimplify to children students whose WM is still developing, or to young learners who require further support needs or adults with diminished working memory. Sana et al. (2018), have conducted laboratory trails across five different studies. Overall, the findings suggest that interleaving is appropriate for delivering instruction than does blocking. On hundred fourteen respondents took part in the research. There was no theoretical framework provided for this research. The article makes an original contribution to the growing volume of knowledge by representing that interleaving benefits learning. The research evidence also indicate that interleaving utility might be achieved in spite of WMC. The study can be useful for my future research because it goes into detail about the differences in interleaving benefits across varying content fields and people of deviating WMC.
Shimizu, T. (., C.A.). (2010). Memory interleaving in a high-speed switching environment Retrieved from https://patents.google.com/patent/US7248596B2/en
This study aimed to show that modern computer systems are based on the sequential paradigm of program performance where architectural systems counter sequences via commands step-by-step. At the same time, abstraction is also a significant component of computing. Thus, memory interleaving is in one way or the other an abstraction approach. The architectural procedures used to accomplish the fast enhancements on serial machines, including interleaving, are available to creators of corresponding computers. The author indicates that the high-speed switching programs offer the potential to create a computing paradigm in which users have seamless access to multiple computational resources required as a component of the key process. Since system memory is a shared resource, the user has to ensure there is a balance in memory trafficking. This is a useful source for getting an outline of how memory interleaves in a high-speed switching background. This is also an indispensable work for anyone wishing to understand how an interconnection network functions.
Zulkiply, N. (2013). Effect of Interleaving Exemplars Presented as Auditory Text on Long- term Retention in Inductive Learning. Procedia – Social and Behavioral Sciences, 97, 238–245. doi:10.1016/j.sbspro.2013.10.228.
The article focuses on a laboratory study using aurally presented texts to explore the usefulness of interleaving models from multiple clusters. Zulkiply also wanted to ascertain whether or not these exemplars differ with retention interval in inductive teaching practice. The respondents of these study were 40 undergraduate students; thus, the sample size was small. Drawing on data from the available body of studies, the article found that the advantages associated with short-range attention from the interleaved study phase in an inductive teaching practice corresponded with results from previous research evidence. Zulkiply asserts that interleaving effects in instruction involves the correlation amongst induction and discrimination practices. The interleaving of models from various classification in a restricted manner could have encouraged and boosted discriminative learning. Another likely account for the interleaving effects in inductive training practice is the function of retention. The author claims that grouping together students diminishes learning by negatively affecting the level of focus that individuals’ have during recurrent study phases.