New insights in the role of working memory in carry and borrow operations

The present paper provides a state-of-the-art overview concerning the role of working mem-ory in carry and borrow operations in metal arithmetic. The role of the executive working-memory component is discussed, alongside the contribution of the phonological and visuo-spatial working-memory components. Moreover, a broad view on various carry characteristics (such as the number of carry/borrow operations and the value of the carry) and various operations (addition, subtraction, and multiplication) is provided. Finally, some ideas for fur-ther research are offered

The Development of Working Memory: Exploring the Complementarity of Two Models

Author version made available in accordance with the publisher's policy for non-mandated open access submission. Under Elsevier's copyright, non-mandated authors are permitted to make work available in an institutional repository.The aim of the paper was to further explore the complementarity of the working memory models postulated by Pascual-Leone and Baddeley. Five-, six-, eight- and nine-year-old children were assessed on two working memory tasks, which have frequently been used within the respective streams of research: the Mr. Peanut task and the Corsi blocks task. Results indicated a developmental increase in spatial short-term memory for both tasks. Concurrent spatial suppression reduced performance on the two tasks in all four age groups. By contrast, articulatory suppression only interfered with recall on the Mr. Peanut task, and only in the older children. The two models were shown to make their own specific contribution to the interpretation of the data, attesting to their complementarity. Pascual-Leone’s theory offered a clear explanation of the results concerning the central aspects of working memory, i.e. the stepwise age-related increase in performance, whereas Baddeley’s model provided a convincing account of the findings regarding the peripheral phonological and visuo-spatial components, i.e. the effects of articulatory and spatial suppression. Key Words: short-term memory; spatial memory; information processing capacity; memory development; working memory models; rehearsal strategies; cognitive development

Sequential Neural Processes in Abacus Mental Addition: An EEG and fMRI Case Study

Abacus experts are able to mentally calculate multi-digit numbers rapidly. Some behavioral and neuroimaging studies have suggested a visuospatial and visuomotor strategy during abacus mental calculation. However, no study up to now has attempted to dissociate temporally the visuospatial neural process from the visuomotor neural process during abacus mental calculation. In the present study, an abacus expert performed the mental addition tasks (8-digit and 4-digit addends presented in visual or auditory modes) swiftly and accurately. The 100% correct rates in this expert’s task performance were significantly higher than those of ordinary subjects performing 1-digit and 2-digit addition tasks. ERPs, EEG source localizations, and fMRI results taken together suggested visuospatial and visuomotor processes were sequentially arranged during the abacus mental addition with visual addends and could be dissociated from each other temporally. The visuospatial transformation of the numbers, in which the superior parietal lobule was most likely involved, might occur first (around 380 ms) after the onset of the stimuli. The visuomotor processing, in which the superior/middle frontal gyri were most likely involved, might occur later (around 440 ms). Meanwhile, fMRI results suggested that neural networks involved in the abacus mental addition with auditory stimuli were similar to those in the visual abacus mental addition. The most prominently activated brain areas in both conditions included the bilateral superior parietal lobules (BA 7) and bilateral middle frontal gyri (BA 6). These results suggest a supra-modal brain network in abacus mental addition, which may develop from normal mental calculation networks

When is working memory important for arithmetic?: the impact of strategy and age

Our ability to perform arithmetic relies heavily on working memory, the manipulation and maintenance of information in mind. Previous research has found that in adults, procedural strategies, particularly counting, rely on working memory to a greater extent than retrieval strategies. During childhood there are changes in the types of strategies employed, as well as an increase in the accuracy and efficiency of strategy execution. As such it seems likely that the role of working memory in arithmetic may also change, however children and adults have never been directly compared. This study used traditional dual-task methodology, with the addition of a control load condition, to investigate the extent to which working memory requirements for different arithmetic strategies change with age between 9-11 years, 12-14 years and young adulthood. We showed that both children and adults employ working memory when solving arithmetic problems, no matter what strategy they choose. This study highlights the importance of considering working memory in understanding the difficulties that some children and adults have with mathematics, as well as the need to include working memory in theoretical models of mathematical cognition

Memory Updating and Mental Arithmetic

Is domain-general memory updating ability predictive of calculation skills or are such skills better predicted by the capacity for updating specifically numerical information? Here, we used multidigit mental multiplication (MMM) as a measure for calculating skill as this operation requires the accurate maintenance and updating of information in addition to skills needed for arithmetic more generally. In Experiment 1, we found that only individual differences with regard to a task updating numerical information following addition (MUcalc) could predict the performance of MMM, perhaps owing to common elements between the task and MMM. In Experiment 2, new updating tasks were designed to clarify this: a spatial updating task with no numbers, a numerical task with no calculation, and a word task. The results showed that both MUcalc and the spatial task were able to predict the performance of MMM but only with the more difficult problems, while other updating tasks did not predict performance. It is concluded that relevant processes involved in updating the contents of working memory support mental arithmetic in adults