When ‘Colorless green ideas’ meet working

memory span

July 31, 2007

Olga V. FedorovaEkaterina V. Pechenkova

Lomonosov Moscow State University

CML-07 workshop ‘Science of Cognition: Bridging Gaps between Cognitive Linguistics and Experimental Psychology’

virtualcoglab@fromru.com

?Which way does

memory affect

speech?

Memory is…encoding, storage and retrieval of information

Human memory stores motion

emotion images logic and

linguistic structures

?Which way does

language affect memory

?

Classical cognitive approach:multiple memory systems

LONG-TERMMEMORY

SHORT-TERMMEMORY

Span: 7±2 chunks

Duration: maintains information for 18-30

sec (without rehearsal)

Recoding information into verbal format

Capacity limits are not known

Maintains information for the lifetime (potentially unlimited

duration)

Declarative and procedural formats, including schemata

and semantic networks

REHEARSAL

?

Working memory

AlanBaddeley

LONG-TERM MEMORY

VISUO-SPATIAL

SCETCHPAD

EPISODICBUFFER

PHONO-LOGICAL

LOOP

CENTRALEXECUTIVE

(2001)

Reading span test =

MeredithDaneman

PatriciaCarpenter

Daneman, M., & Carpenter, P. (1980). Individual differences in working memory and reading.

Journal of Verbal Learning and Verbal Behavior, 19, 450-466.

STORAGECOMPONENT

PROCESSINGCOMPONENT +

Reading span in Russian

Elaborated by Olga Fedorova and colleagues in 2001

Processing: reading sentences

Storage: maintaining the final words of these sentences

NB! Russian sentences appear to be much longer if we count the number of syllables,

since the portion of one or two syllable words in Russian is significantly less than in English

Visual or auditory presentation

70 sentences, 12-15 words each

Reading span testReading span test(Russian version)(Russian version)

Тест на определение Тест на определение объема оперативной объема оперативной

памятипамяти

аудиовариантаудиовариант

(audio)(audio)

Данный эксперимент тестирует объем Вашей оперативной памяти; информация в ней хранится всего несколько секунд.

Вам необходимо будет запоминать и потом воспроизводить последние слова предложений, которые Вы будете слышать, точно в той же форме и в том же порядке, в которой они были произнесены.

This is the test of your working memory. The working memory stores information for just a few seconds.

You will be listening to sentences, and you will have to memorize the final words of these sentences. Then you will have to recall these words keeping their form and the order of appearance.

Количество предложений будет неуклонно возрастать, тем самым Ваше задание будет усложняться.

Если Вы не можете вспомнить последнее слово какого-то предложения, переходите к следующему.

The number of the sentences in a series will be increased step by step, so the difficulty of the task will grow.

If you cannot recall some word, please, skip it and go on to the next one.

Эксперимент начинается!Эксперимент начинается!

Ready? Press the spacebar…Ready? Press the spacebar…

нажмитенажмите пробел!пробел!

Слушайте предложение 1Слушайте предложение 1

In September, every child, including myself, will go to school.

Listen to the sentence 1Listen to the sentence 1

Слушайте предложение 2Слушайте предложение 2

Mike sat down on the bench next to his home and started to look at the people

passing.

Listen to the sentence 2Listen to the sentence 2

Пожалуйста, повторите последние Пожалуйста, повторите последние слова этих двух предложенийслова этих двух предложений

Please, recall the final words of these Please, recall the final words of these two sentencestwo sentences

?

Школу School

Прохожих Passing

нажмитенажмите пробел!пробел!

Эксперимент начинается!Эксперимент начинается!

Ready? Press the spacebar…Ready? Press the spacebar…

Слушайте предложение 1Слушайте предложение 1

I like ice-cream very much, but afterwards I have an ache in my throat.

Listen to the sentence 1Listen to the sentence 1

Слушайте предложение 2Слушайте предложение 2

Tomorrow all members of our family will go to the mountains for skiing.

Listen to the sentence 2Listen to the sentence 2

Слушайте предложение 3Слушайте предложение 3

In order to get to the restaurant from our house, you should turn to the right and

then again to the right.

Listen to the sentence 3Listen to the sentence 3

Слушайте предложение 4Слушайте предложение 4

I haven't seen Anton since then because he has moved from our district.

Listen to the sentence 4Listen to the sentence 4

Слушайте предложение 5Слушайте предложение 5

As her birthday present, the girl was given a big fancy doll.

Listen to the sentence 5Listen to the sentence 5

Пожалуйста, повторите последние Пожалуйста, повторите последние слова этих пяти предложенийслова этих пяти предложений

Please, recall the final words of these Please, recall the final words of these five sentencesfive sentences

?

Горло Throat

Лыжах Skiing

Направо Right

Района District

Куклу Doll

Russian version vs. English

Russian English

Proportion of the Low-Span participants (span<4) 64,5% 50%

Auditory presentation advantage (vs. visual) greater weaker

Amount of the word form errors more less

Short final words advantage (vs. long) yes yes

What does the testreally measure?

Authors of the test: working memory for reading

Further common view: storage capacity that determines linguistic skills

Alan Baddeley: effectiveness of the central executive and episodic

buffer

Kyllonen & Christal: general intelligence

Why is there a variety of suggestions?

Reading span test is a dual task

Dual task paradigm

Common resource (structural or energetic)

Yes No

A tradeoff between a primary and a secondary

taskNo interference

Reading span test is a dual task

STORAGECOMPONENT

PROCESSINGCOMPONENT +

Reading sentences Memorizing final words

extracting maintaining

THERE IS A TRADEOFF,BUT…

Which one is

the primary task?

No component is

explicitly set

as a primary task

human ability of organizing one’s

memoryand of using memory

aids and semantic schemata

What does the testreally measure?

Our hypothesis:

Study I:semantically related final words

И мне стало грустно, когда я подумал, что они не пойдут завтракать в шикарный ресторан.

Содрав с маленьких сухощавых рук перчатки, Нина последний раз в жизни ела моллюски.

Увидев маленькое кафе, он юркнул туда, чтобы передохнуть, и заказал еще одну чашку кофе.

Вино выдерживали слишком долго, и оно совсем испортилось и потеряло свой цвет и вкус.

Experimental condition

Study I:semantically related final words

And I felt sad when I thought that they wouldn’t go for a breakfast to a fancy restaurant.

Nina teared off her gloves from her small lean hands and for the last time in her life was eating shellfish.

When he got a sight of a small café, he dropped in to have some rest and ordered another cup of coffee.

The vine was aged for too long, so it finally was spoilt and has lost its color and taste.

Experimental condition

Мы дошли до двери, и я видел, как она быстро переступила порог и пошла по вестибюлю.

Надо было достойно вознаградить усилия того, кто достиг совершенства в своем ремесле.

Он сидел на скамье и показался мне темной, бесформенной грудой в образе человека.

Граф закрыл окно и задернул шторы: сквозняк и электрический свет привлекают молнию.

Study I:semantically related final words

Control condition – standard test

We came up to a door, and I saw her quickly stepping over the doorstep and going along the vestibule.

An appropriate reward was needed for the effort of one who reached perfection in his profession.

He was sitting on the bench and seemed to me as a dark shapeless pile in appearance of a human.

The earl closed the window and drew the draperies since the draught and the electric light attract the lighting.

Study I:semantically related final words

Control condition – standard test

Study I: Results

40 participants,visual presentation, reading aloud

Scores: 5 percent for each group reported correctly

Semantically related final

wordsStandard test

58% 45%

High span Low span

Study I: Conclusion

Accessibility of one’ssemantic schemata and memory aids

is a factor that influencesthe working memory span

Russian reading span data supports Baddeley’s model

Short final words are better recalled than the long ones

Artificial articulation difficulties decreases the test score

Semantically related words that could be linked to each other by means of visual memory aids are recalled better than a typical random word set

Any other mental load decreases the results

A r

ela

ted

su

bco

mp

on

en

t of

Bad

dele

y’s

mod

el

Phonolo-gical loop

Visuo-spatial

scetchpad

Central executive

Working memory span correlates with text comprehension

Daneman, M., & Carpenter, P. (1980). Individual differences in working memory and reading.

Journal of Verbal Learning and Verbal Behavior, 19, 450-466.

EXAMPLE:

Comprehension of the text with large reference distances in people with high and low ‘reading span’

It was midnight and the jungle was very still. Suddenly the cry of a wolf pierced the air. This anguished note was followed by a flurry of activity. All the beasts of the jungle recognized that an urgent meeting had been summoned by the lion, their king. Representatives from each species made rapid preparations to get to the river clearing. This was where all such emergency assemblies were held. The elephant and tiger were the first to arrive. Next came the gorilla, panther and snake. They were followed by the owl and the crocodile. The proceedings were delayed because the leopard had not shown up yet. There was much speculation as to the reasons for the midnight alarm. Finally he arrived and the meeting could commence.

Question: Who finally arrived?

Sitting with Richie, Archie, Walter and the rest of my gang in the Grill yesterday, I began to feel uneasy. Robbie had put a dime in the juke box. It was blaring one of the latest "Rock and Roll" favorites. I was studying, in horror, the reactions of my friends to the music. I was especially perturbed by the expression on my best friend's face. Wayne looked intense and was pounding the table furiously to the beat. Now, I like most of the things other teenage boys like. I like girls with soft blonde hair, girls with dark curly hair, in fact all girls. I like milkshakes, football games and beach parties. I like denim jeans, fancy T-shirts and sneakers. It is not that I dislike rock music but I think it is supposed to be fun and not taken too seriously. And here he was, "all shook up" and serious over the crazy music.

Question: Who was "all shook up" and serious over the music?

Reference distance 2

Reference distance 6

0102030405060708090

100

small(2- 3) medium (4- 5) large(6- 7)

Reference distance, sentences

% t

he

per

centa

ge

of

corr

ect

resp

onse

s 2345

Comprehension in subjects withlow vs. high reading span

Reading span

Why is the correlation? There is no correlation of linguistic skills with standard single task working memory test like word or digit span (Turner&Engle, 1989).

The correlation is there even if we substitute the sentences by arithmetic expressions and/or final words by final figures (Turner&Engle, 1989).

Modifications of the processing task (i.e. different types of judgements about the sentence) give correlations at the range 0.52-0.63 (Waters & Caplan, 1996)

Test-retest reliability is only moderate: correlations at the range 0,41-0,54 (Kuntsi et al., 2001)

Study II: Is the source of interference syntactically

specific?

Глокая куздра штеко будланула бокра и курдячит бокрёнка…

Processing component task:

informational visual search verbal with high attention demands and low syntactic

demandsMaterial: Russian grammatical, but nonsense

sentences (like one invented by L.V. Shcherba, 1920th)with real Russian words embedded

Colorless green ideas sleep furiously

Compare to

by Noam Chomsky (1957)

Глокая куздра штеко будланула бокра и курдячит бокрёнка…

by L.V. Shcherba, 1920th

ИНСТРУКЦИЯПросим Вас:

прочитать предложение про себя один раз и запомнить из него все русские слова;

когда предложение исчезнет с экрана, назвать все русские слова из этого

предложения в той же форме и в том же порядке, в которой они были в

предложении.

TEST INSTRUCTIONSPlease, read each sentence silently once, and

memorize all Russian words that would be there;

on disappearance of the sentence, recall all Russian words keeping their word form and

order

Предложение будет появляться на экране на несколько секунд.

Количество русских слов в одном предложении будет постепенно возрастать.

Each sentence will appear on the screen for a few second. The number of the Russian words in the sentence will be increased step by step.

Йоу, биктя ю рекетя быстро шлемзит худамп хлеб лопатик.

Yoou, biktya yu reketya, bystro [rapidly] shlemzit khudamp khleb [the bread] lopatik

Нажмите пробел!

Брундая куздра, живущая ф трукате хуранта, громко куздряет рядом проходящих бяко людей.

Brundaya kuzdra, zhivuzhchaya [living] f trukate khuranta, gromko [loudly] kuzdryaet ryadom [near] prokhodyazhchikh [passing by] byako lyudey [people].

Нажмите пробел!

Study II: Results

32 participants,visual presentation

Scores: 5 percent for each group reported correctly

Visual search Standard test

54% 74%

High span High span

There is a difference (ANOVA F=25.39, p<0.001)There is a medium correlation

(Spearman’s rho=0.36, p=0.045

Study II: Conclusion

each subcomponent ofthe Daneman-Carpenter task

requires both general and specificprocessing resources

Conclusions Russian version of the standard reading span

test fits the classic model of the working memory structure proposed by Alan Baddeley

The test apparently provides a measure of individual verbal processing abilities rather than individual working memory capacity as such

Thank you twas brillig,

and the slithy toves for your

did gyre and gimble kind attention in the wabe!

Спасибо воркалось. Хливкие шорьки пырялись по

наве, и хрюкотали за внимание зелюки как

мюмзики в мове!