Developmental Trends for Object and Spatial Working Memory: a Psychophysiological Analysis

This study examined developmental trends in object and spatial working memory (WM) using heart rate (HR) to provide an index of covert cognitive processes. Participants in 4 age groups (6-7, 9-10, 11-12, 18-26, n = 20 each) performed object and spatial WM tasks, in which each trial was followed by f...

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Bibliographic Details
Published inChild development Vol. 78; no. 3; pp. 987 - 1000
Main Authors Van Leijenhorst, Linda, Crone, Eveline A., Van der Molen, Maurits W.
Format Journal Article
LanguageEnglish
Published Malden, USA Blackwell Publishing Inc 01.05.2007
Blackwell Publishers
Blackwell Publishing
Blackwell
Blackwell Publishing Ltd
Subjects
Adolescent
Adult
Adults
Age differences
Age groups
Biological and medical sciences
Child
Child Development
Child Development - physiology
Children
Children & youth
Cognition
Cognition & reasoning
Cognitive development
Cognitive Processes
Cognitive psychology
Developmental biology
Developmental psychology
Empirical Articles
Experimental psychology
Experimentation
Feedback
Female
Fundamental and applied biological sciences. Psychology
Heart rate
Humans
Indexes
Male
Memory
Memory, Short-Term
Metabolism
Negative feedback
Physiology
Psychology
Psychology. Psychoanalysis. Psychiatry
Psychology. Psychophysiology
Psychophysiological aspects
Psychophysiology
Psychophysiology - methods
Space Perception
Spatial Ability
Task Analysis
Task performance
Trend Analysis
Trends
Working memory
Young adults
Human
Cognition
Preadolescent
Heart rate
School age
Adolescent
Young adult
Hemodynamics
Cognitive development
Working memory
Child
Psychophysiology
Spatial memory
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Summary:This study examined developmental trends in object and spatial working memory (WM) using heart rate (HR) to provide an index of covert cognitive processes. Participants in 4 age groups (6-7, 9-10, 11-12, 18-26, n = 20 each) performed object and spatial WM tasks, in which each trial was followed by feedback. Spatial WM task performance reached adult levels before object WM task performance. The differential developmental trends for object and spatial WM found in this study are taken to suggest that these WM components are separable. Negative performance feedback elicited HR slowing that was more pronounced for adults than for children. The development of performance monitoring as indexed by covert HR slowing following performance feedback contributes to WM performance.
Bibliography:ark:/67375/WNG-9X3N7T9K-X
ArticleID:CDEV1045
istex:1F76D43AB66BD5E818600ADFB9A0D8007C0A3BB5
The research reported in this article was supported by Dutch Science Foundation Grant NWO‐SGW 222‐0590. We would like to thank Drs. Silvia Bunge and Michiel Westenberg for helpful comments on a first draft of this article. The help of Gabriel van Uitert in collecting the data is greatly appreciated. Bert van Beek was instrumental in programming the object and spatial WM tasks and Dr. Mariette Huizinga is thanked for providing the Random Number Generation Task.
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ISSN:0009-3920
1467-8624
DOI:10.1111/j.1467-8624.2007.01045.x