The differential relations between verbal, numerical and spatial working memory abilities and children's reading comprehension
Working memory predicts children's reading comprehension but it is not clear whether this relation is due to a modality-specific or general working memory. This study, which investigated the relations between children's reading skills and working memory (WM) abilities in 3 modalities, ex...
| Main Authors: | , , |
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| Format: | Article |
| Language: | English |
| Published: |
Kura Publishing
2011-07-01
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| Series: | International Electronic Journal of Elementary Education |
| Subjects: | |
| Online Access: | https://iejee.com/index.php/IEJEE/article/view/215 |
| Summary: | Working memory predicts children's reading comprehension but it is not clear whether this relation is
due to a modality-specific or general working memory. This study, which investigated the relations
between children's reading skills and working memory (WM) abilities in 3 modalities, extends previous
work by including measures of both reading comprehension and reading accuracy. Tests of word
reading accuracy and reading comprehension, and working memory tests in three different modalities
(verbal, numerical and spatial), were given to 197 6- to 11-year old children. The results support the
view that working memory tasks that require the processing and recall of symbolic information (words
and numbers) are better predictors of reading comprehension than tasks that require visuo-spatial
storage and processing. The different measures of verbal and numerical working memory were not
equally good predictors of reading comprehension, but their predictive power depended on neither
the word vs. numerical contrast nor the complexity of the processing component. In general,
performance on the verbal and numerical working memory tasks predicted reading comprehension,
but not reading accuracy, and spatial WM did not predict either. The patterns of relations between the
measures of working memory and reading comprehension ability were relatively constant across the
age group tested. |
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| ISSN: | 1307-9298 1307-9298 |