scholarly journals Training Working Memory in Adolescents Using Serious Game Elements: Pilot Randomized Controlled Trial (Preprint)

2017 ◽  
Author(s):  
Wouter J Boendermaker ◽  
Thomas E Gladwin ◽  
Margot Peeters ◽  
Pier J M Prins ◽  
Reinout W Wiers
Keyword(s):  
Working Memory ◽  
High School Students ◽  
Controlled Trial ◽  
Working Memory Capacity ◽  
Memory Capacity ◽  
Addictive Behaviors ◽  
School Students ◽  
Placebo Condition ◽  
Game Elements ◽  
Over Time

BACKGROUND Working memory capacity has been found to be impaired in adolescents with various psychological problems, such as addictive behaviors. Training of working memory capacity can lead to significant behavioral improvements, but it is usually long and tedious, taxing participants’ motivation to train. OBJECTIVE This study aimed to evaluate whether adding game elements to the training could help improve adolescents’ motivation to train while improving cognition. METHODS A total of 84 high school students were allocated to a working memory capacity training, a gamified working memory capacity training, or a placebo condition. Working memory capacity, motivation to train, and drinking habits were assessed before and after training. RESULTS Self-reported evaluations did not show a self-reported preference for the game, but participants in the gamified working memory capacity training condition did train significantly longer. The game successfully increased motivation to train, but this effect faded over time. Working memory capacity increased equally in all conditions but did not lead to significantly lower drinking, which may be due to low drinking levels at baseline. CONCLUSIONS We recommend that future studies attempt to prolong this motivational effect, as it appeared to fade over time.

scholarly journals Working Memory Capacity and Familiarity With Testing Environment

2020 ◽  
Vol 9 (1) ◽  
Author(s):  
Yu Yi Lu ◽  
Jonathan Jones ◽  
Rachel Booth
Keyword(s):  
Working Memory ◽  
High School Students ◽  
Test Performance ◽  
Standardized Test ◽  
Memory Span ◽  
Working Memory Capacity ◽  
Memory Capacity ◽  
School Students ◽  
Test Analysis ◽  
Surrounding Environment

Previous studies have shown converging evidence that negative perceptions of the surrounding environment lead to lower standardized test performance among stigmatized individuals. However, there has been minimal research done about the underlying cognitive mechanism that may account for these effects. I hypothesized that unfamiliarity with the surrounding environment interferes with test performance because it limits individuals’ working memory capacity. This within-subjects experiment, with a total of 35 Leland High School students, tested that hypothesis. A self-produced version of the working memory span task was given to all participants in both of their prospective classrooms, familiar and unfamiliar. Through a matched-paired t-test analysis, the results demonstrated that unfamiliarity with the surrounding environment significantly limited one’s working memory capacity. Implications for future studies are discussed.

scholarly journals Meditation for Increased Mindfulness and Memory: An Analysis on the Impact of Meditation on Mindfulness and Working Memory Capacity in High School Students

2020 ◽  
Vol 9 (2) ◽  
Author(s):  
Rebeccah Fleischmann ◽  
Michael Posner
Keyword(s):  
High School ◽  
Working Memory ◽  
High School Students ◽  
Working Memory Capacity ◽  
Memory Capacity ◽  
Memory Test ◽  
Control Group ◽  
School Students ◽  
Meditation Group ◽  
The Impact

70% of high school students see anxiety and depression as a “major problem” among their peers (Pew Research Center). Meditation decreases anxiety and stress according to Harvard researchers. Stress and memory are very much connected as a recent study concluded that non-stressed people remember more items on average than stressed people. Although several studies have been done on the impacts of meditation, there has been no research done specifically on the impact of meditation on high school students’ working memory. This study utilized a pre-post survey design and a running control group to determine whether mindfulness and working memory capacity increased as a result of a week of daily meditation. Students were randomly assigned to the mindfulness meditation group or to the running control group. Both groups took The Human Benchmark memory test and the Mindfulness Attention Awareness Scale (a Likert scale) before and after a week of meditation or running. The results proved to be significant, showing that mindfulness increased on average by .8 points, while the control only increased by .03 points on average. In addition, memory test scores increased by 40.3% for the meditation group compared to 8.3% for the control group.

scholarly journals The Construction and Validation of a New Listening Span Task

2021 ◽  
Vol 25 (1) ◽  
pp. 39-56
Author(s):  
Bartolo Bazan
Keyword(s):  
Working Memory ◽  
High School Students ◽  
Junior High School ◽  
Working Memory Capacity ◽  
Span Task ◽  
Word Recall ◽  
Validity Evidence ◽  
World Knowledge ◽  
School Students ◽  
Unidimensional Construct

The listening span task is a measure of working memory that requires participants to process sets of increasing numbers of utterances and store the last word of each utterance for recall at the end of each set. Measures to date have contained an exceedingly demanding processing component, possibly leading to insufficient resources to meet the word recall requirement, which may have affected the sensitivity of the measure to distinguish different levels of working memory. Further, tasks thus far have asked participants to verify the content utterances based on knowledge, which may have confounded the measurement of working memory capacity with world knowledge. An additional weakness is that they lack sound psychometric construct validity evidence, which clouds what these tools actually measure. This pilot study presents a listening span task that accounts for preceding methodological shortcomings, which was administered to 31 Japanese junior high school students. The participants listened to ten sets (two sets of equal length of two, three, four, five and six utterances) of short casual utterances, judged whether they made sense in Japanese, and recalled the last word of each utterance in the set. Performance was assessed through a scoring procedure new to listening span tasks in which credit is given for the words recalled in order of appearance until memory failure. The data was analyzed through the Rasch model, which produces evidence for different aspects of validity and indicates if the items in a test measure a unidimensional construct. The results provided validity evidence for the use of the new listening span task and revealed that the instrument measured a single unidimensional construct.

Structure and Correlates of the German Version of the Brief UPPS Impulsive Behavior Scales

2009 ◽  
Vol 25 (3) ◽  
pp. 175-185 ◽  
Author(s):  
Doris Keye ◽  
Oliver Wilhelm ◽  
Klaus Oberauer
Keyword(s):  
Working Memory ◽  
High School Students ◽  
Working Memory Capacity ◽  
Measurement Model ◽  
Self Report ◽  
German Version ◽  
Impulsive Behavior ◽  
School Students ◽  
Measurement Models ◽  
Final Item

The article proposes a shortened German version of the UPPS impulsive behavior scales. In Study 1, 149 high-school students completed the UPPS questionnaire, a Big-Five questionnaire, additional established self-report scales to measure conscientiousness and impulsivity, as well as tests of working memory capacity, reasoning, and clerical speed. Measurement models were applied to the full translated UPPS scales using confirmatory factor analysis. A satisfactory measurement model could be established only by removing many of the initial items. The remaining items correlated as expected with other self-report and ability measures: Substantial correlations with impulsivity and conscientiousness contrasted with zero correlations with working memory and reasoning ability. The association between impulsivity factors and perceptual speed was primarily a result of the number of solved items rather than the number of mistakes in the speed tasks. In Study 2 the reduced item set from Study 1 was administered to 246 participants to replicate the model. The fit of this model supports the construct validity of the final item set. The generally low correlations of the UPPS with cognitive variables questions interpretations of self-reported impulsivity that are overly focused on cognition. More appropriate cognitive criteria for impulsivity constructs should be established.

scholarly journals Effect of Working Memory on Students’ Attitude towards Mathematics at Secondary Level

2019 ◽  
Vol 35 (3) ◽  
Author(s):  
Asim Nazir
Keyword(s):  
Working Memory ◽  
Working Memory Capacity ◽  
Secondary Level ◽  
Memory Capacity ◽  
Rural Students ◽  
School Type ◽  
School Students ◽  
Chi Square ◽  
Attitude Towards Mathematics ◽  
The Difference

The aim of this study was to find out the influence of working memory on secondary school students’ attitude towards mathematics. The sample of the study was comprised of 1303 students of age 14-15. Digit backward test was used to measure the working memory capacity of the students while questionnaire was used for the measurement of their attitude towards mathematics. Data were analyzed using the chi-square test to find the effect of working memory capacity on students’ attitude towards mathematics at secondary level. Independent sample t-test was used to find the difference between students’ working memory capacity based on gender, grades, school type, residential area, and elective subjects. Results suggest that the working memory of the students is consistent with their age. Female students have higher working memory capacity than male students. Urban students have higher memory than rural students. Overall results revealed that students with higher working memory have better attitude towards mathematics than the students with low working memory capacity at secondary level. It was recommended that there is a need of giving attention towards the working memory capacity of students for developing positive attitude towards mathematics.

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