The role of visuo-spatial working memory in map learning: new findings from a map drawing paradigm

Recently, increasing attention has been devoted to the study of the role of visuo-spatial working memory (VSWM) in environmental learning and spatial navigation. The present research was aimed at investigating the role of VSWM in map learning using a map drawing paradigm. In the first study, a dual task methodology was used. Results showed that map drawing was selectively impaired by a spatial tapping task that was executed during the map learning phase, hence supporting the hypothesis that VSWM plays an essential role in learning from maps. In the second study, using a correlational methodology, it was shown that performance in simultaneous VSWM tasks, but not in sequential VSWM tasks, predicted map drawing skills. These skills “in turn” correlated with map learning abilities. Finally, in the third study, we replicated the results of the second study, by using a different map. To our knowledge, the present study is the first to find evidence that the simultaneous aspects of VSWM play a fundamental role in learning from maps.     

Gender differences in memory for object and word locations

It has been hypothesized that gender differences in visuo-spatial working memory (VSWM) are larger in tasks requiring active elaboration of the material. In the present study we explored this issue by using an object relocation task, with both verbal and visual stimuli. The involvement of active processes was manipulated through the type of transformation required on the stimulus and through the introduction of different kinds of interference. In the three experiments reported, participants were shown either words or cartoon object icons in different locations and had to relocate them in either the same format or in the opposite one (object icons could be transformed into words and vice versa). Males outperformed females in the most demanding conditions, in which object icons and words were presented together in the encoding phase, and both had to be transformed in the recall phase; or when more demanding interferences were used. Our data suggest that the retention strategy was similar for the two groups and that the gender effect is related to a selective female difficulty associated with the increase in active VSWM processing. These findings further support the hypothesized distinction between the passive and active components of VSWM and illustrate the role that this distinction might play in accounting for individual differences.     

Age-related differences in the use of spatial and categorical relationships in a visuo-spatial working memory task

Research examining object identity and location processing in visuo-spatial working memory (VSWM) has yielded inconsistent results on whether age differences exist in VSWM. The present study investigated whether these inconsistencies may stem from age-related differences in VSWM sub-processes, and whether processing of component VSWM information can be facilitated. In two experiments, younger and older adults studied 5 × 5 grids containing five objects in separate locations. In a continuous recognition paradigm, participants were tested on memory for object identity, location, or identity and location information combined. Spatial and categorical relationships were manipulated within grids to provide trial-level facilitation. In Experiment 1, randomizing trial types (location, identity, combination) assured that participants could not predict the information that would be queried. In Experiment 2, blocking trials by type encouraged strategic processing. Thus, we manipulated the nature of the task through object categorical relationship and spatial organization, and trial blocking. Our findings support age-related declines in VSWM. Additionally, grid organizations (categorical and spatial relationships), and trial blocking differentially affected younger and older adults. Younger adults used spatial organizations more effectively whereas older adults demonstrated an association bias. Our finding also suggests that older adults may be less efficient than younger adults in strategically engaging information processing.     

Cross language learning disabilities and verbal versus spatial memory

The research reported in this talk involves comparisons of verbal and spatial memory tasks across groups of children (and adults) with different types of learning difficulties. The research focuses on children with literacy acquisition problems and investigates whether such problems are related to specific areas of deficit. In the first piece of research, children with dyslexia (literacy learning problems) and dyspraxia (motor deficits) were contrasted on measures of memory (for example, tasks that required the retention of sequences of verbal material or spatial movements) and additional measures of literacy (reading and spelling), phonological (awareness of sounds within words) and motor (fine and gross motor tasks) functioning. The data were consistent with a dissociation between tasks/groups such that dyslexics showed weak phonological processing but intact visuo-spatial processing, whereas children with dyspraxia showed weaknesses on task involving visuo-spatial information, but average levels of performance on tasks that required phonological processing. Similar results were identified amongst adult groups, consistent with a deviant level of functioning rather than a developmental delay. A second line of research contrasted children with or without literacy problems across language backgrounds (English, Arabic, Chinese and bilingual children). Consistent with the dyslexia data, children with poor English literacy skills showed weaknesses in verbal/phonological memory tasks but not in visuo-spatial memory. However, for Chinese-language children, visuo-spatial memory differed between good and poor literacy learners, but there was little evidence for verbal memory differences. In contrast, the Arabic and bilingual children showed differences in both verbal and visuo-spatial areas, although the evidence was consistent with enhanced visual/spatial skills amongst the good literacy groups, rather than poor literacy children showing weaknesses in those tasks. These data suggest that the influence of memory skills on learning may vary with the language of instruction. A final line of enquiry considers whether teaching strategies to children with learning difficulties may overcome some of the identified memory deficits and lead to better levels of learning. English language children with learning difficulties were taught visual and verbal strategies to support retention of materials in short-term memory tasks. In the majority of cases, learning was improved when it focused on visuo-spatial strategies but not when verbal strategies were used. These data support the relationship between learning difficulties and different aspects of short-term memory that may lead to poor levels of learning. It also presents evidence that memory (particularly those related to visuo-spatial) processes are influenced by the context within which learning is taking place, both in terms of the language of instruction and the strategies used to support learning. For some children with educational difficulties based around language-related deficits, visuo-spatial strategies may support acquisition.     

The orientation of young and older adults' mental representations of their home town with familiar and new landmarks

Familiarity with an environment produces refined mental representations in adults of all ages, but it is not clear whether these representations tend to have a north-up orientation and whether familiarity facilitates the learning of new spatial information, especially in ageing. Thirty-two young and 32 older adults studied a map of their home town that included familiar and new fictitious landmarks, then performed pointing tasks, some aligned with the cardinal points south–north (SN), and others counter-aligned, north–south (NS). A measure of visuo-spatial working memory (VSWM) and a questionnaire on pleasure in exploring were also administered. The results showed that performance was better when pointing SN than NS (alignment effect), whereas pointing performance for familiar landmarks was similar for SN and NS alignments (no alignment effect). No interaction involving age was found. VSWM emerged as a significant predictor of pointing performance. Spatial mental representations of familiar environments are elaborate and flexible as regards familiar landmarks, in both young and older adults; and a familiar layout does not seem to enhance older adults' spatial memory as regards new landmarks.     

Gender differences in memory for object and word locations

It has been hypothesized that gender differences in visuo-spatial working memory (VSWM) are larger in tasks requiring active elaboration of the material. In the present study we explored this issue by using an object relocation task, with both verbal and visual stimuli. The involvement of active processes was manipulated through the type of transformation required on the stimulus and through the introduction of different kinds of interference. In the three experiments reported, participants were shown either words or cartoon object icons in different locations and had to relocate them in either the same format or in the opposite one (object icons could be transformed into words and vice versa). Males outperformed females in the most demanding conditions, in which object icons and words were presented together in the encoding phase, and both had to be transformed in the recall phase; or when more demanding interferences were used. Our data suggest that the retention strategy was similar for the two groups and that the gender effect is related to a selective female difficulty associated with the increase in active VSWM processing. These findings further support the hypothesized distinction between the passive and active components of VSWM and illustrate the role that this distinction might play in accounting for individual differences.     

Aging and the intrusion superiority effect in visuo-spatial working memory

This study investigated the active component of visuo-spatial working memory (VSWM) in younger and older adults testing the hypotheses that elderly individuals have a poorer performance than younger ones and that errors in active VSWM tasks depend, at least partially, on difficulties in avoiding intrusions (i.e., avoiding already activated information). In two experiments, participants were presented with sequences of matrices on which three positions were pointed out sequentially: their task was to process all the positions but indicate only the final position of each sequence. Results showed a poorer performance in the elderly compared to the younger group and a higher number of intrusion (errors due to activated but irrelevant positions) rather than invention (errors consisting of pointing out a position never indicated by the experiementer) errors. The number of errors increased when a concurrent task was introduced (Experiment 1) and it was affected by different patterns of matrices (Experiment 2). In general, results show that elderly people have an impaired VSWM and produce a large number of errors due to inhibition failures. However, both the younger and the older adults' visuo-spatial working memory was affected by the presence of activated irrelevant information, the reduction of the available resources, and task constraints.     

Visuo-Spatial Working Memory Span: A Sensitive Measure of Cognitive Deficits in Children With ADHD

Working memory (WM) has been hypothesised to be impaired in attention-deficit/hyperactivity disorder (ADHD). However, there are few studies reported on tests measuring visuo-spatial WM (VSWM) in ADHD. Some of these studies used paradigms including episodic memory, others only used low memory loads. In the present study we used a VSWM test that has not been used previously in ADHD research. The sensitivity of the VSWM test and a choice reaction time (CRT) test was evaluated in a pilot study by comparing them to two commonly used tests in ADHD-research; the Continuous Performance Test (CPT) and a Go/no-go test, in children with and without ADHD. The groups differed significantly in performance on the VSWM test (P<.01) and CRT (P<.05) but not on the CPT (P>.1) or on the Go/no-go test (P>.1). The results from the VSWM and CRT tests were replicated in a larger sample of participants (80 boys; 27 boys with ADHD and 53 controls, mean age 11.4 years). The difference between the groups was significant for both the VSWM test (P<.01) and the CRT test (P<.01). The effect size (ES) of the VSWM test was 1.34. There was a significant age-by-group interaction on the VSWM test, with larger group differences for the older children (P<.01). Our results show that the VSWM test is a sensitive measure of cognitive deficits in ADHD and it supports the hypothesis that deficits in VSWM is a major component of ADHD.     

The development of visuo-spatial working memory

Children's performance on tests of visuo-spatial working memory improves with age, although relatively little is known about why this happens. One explanation concerns the development of the ability to recode visually presented information into phonological form. This process appears to be used from around 8 years of age and is a major contributor to tasks in which stimuli can be verbally labelled. However, evidence suggests that phonological recoding cannot account for all of the age-related change in performance on visuo-spatial working memory tasks. In this review, four other mechanisms (knowledge, processing strategies, processing speed, and attentional capacity) are considered in terms of their contribution to children's visuo-spatial working memory development.     

Evidence for a double dissociation between spatial-simultaneous and spatial-sequential working memory in visuospatial (nonverbal) learning disabled children

The paper describes the performance of three children with specific visuospatial working memory (VSWM) impairments (Study 1) and three children with visuospatial (nonverbal) learning disabilities (Study 2) assessed with a battery of working memory (WM) tests and with a number of school achievement tasks. Overall, performance on WM tests provides evidence of a double dissociation between spatial-simultaneous processes, underpinning the memorization item positioning in a spatial configuration, and spatial-sequential processes, which allow memorization of the presentation order. In both groups of children of the two studies, a selective impairment either on spatial-sequential or on spatial-simultaneous working memory tasks was observed. These data support the existence of -simultaneous and -sequential modality-dependent processes in visuospatial working memory and confirm the importance of distinguishing between different subtypes of visuospatial (nonverbal) learning-disabled children.     

Development of memory for pattern and path: Further evidence for the fractionation of visuo-spatial memory

Evidence from a number of sources now suggests that the visuo-spatial sketchpad (VSSP) of working memory may be composed of two subsystems: one for maintaining visual information and the other for spatial information. In this paper we present three experiments that examine this fractionation using a developmental approach. In Experiment 1, 5-, 8-, and 10-year old children were presented with a visuo-spatial working memory task (the matrices task) with two presentation formats (static and dynamic). A developmental dissociation in performance was found for the static and dynamic conditions of both tasks, suggesting that the activation of separable subsystems of the VSSP is dependent upon a static/dynamic distinction in information content rather than a visual/spatial one. A highly similar pattern of performance was found for a mazes task with static and dynamic formats. However, one strategic activity, the use of simple verbal recoding, may also have been responsible for the observed pattern of performance in the matrices task. In Experiments 2 and 3 this was investigated using concurrent articulatory suppression. No evidence to support this notion was found, and it is therefore proposed that static and dynamic visuo-spatial information is maintained in working memory by separable subcomponents of the VSSP.     

Gender differences in episodic memory and visual working memory including the effects of age

Analysing the relationship between gender and memory, and examining the effects of age on the overall memory-related functioning, are the ongoing goals of psychological research. The present study examined gender and age group differences in episodic memory with respect to the type of task. In addition, these subgroup differences were also analysed in visual working memory. A sample of 366 women and 330 men, aged between 16 and 69 years of age, participated in the current study. Results indicate that women outperformed men on auditory memory tasks, whereas male adolescents and older male adults showed higher level performances on visual episodic and visual working memory measures. However, the size of gender-linked effects varied somewhat across age groups. Furthermore, results partly support a declining performance on episodic memory and visual working memory measures with increasing age. Although age-related losses in episodic memory could not be explained by a decreasing verbal and visuospatial ability with age, women's advantage in auditory episodic memory could be explained by their advantage in verbal ability. Men's higher level visual episodic memory performance was found to result from their advantage in visuospatial ability. Finally, possible methodological, biological, and cognitive explanations for the current findings are discussed.     

Oculomotor involvement in spatial working memory is task-specific

Many everyday tasks, such as remembering where you parked, require the capacity to store and manipulate information about the visual and spatial properties of the world. The ability to represent, remember, and manipulate spatial information is known as visuospatial working memory (VSWM). Despite substantial interest in VSWM the mechanisms responsible for this ability remain debated. One influential idea is that VSWM depends on activity in the eye-movement (oculomotor) system. However, this has proved difficult to test because experimental paradigms that disrupt oculomotor control also interfere with other cognitive systems, such as spatial attention. Here, we present data from a novel paradigm that selectively disrupts activation in the oculomotor system. We show that the inability to make eye-movements is associated with impaired performance on the Corsi Blocks task, but not on Arrow Span, Visual Patterns, Size Estimation or Digit Span tasks. It is argued that the oculomotor system is required to encode and maintain spatial locations indicted by a change in physical salience, but not non-salient spatial locations indicated by the meaning of a symbolic cue. This suggestion offers a way to reconcile the currently conflicting evidence regarding the role of the oculomotor system in spatial working memory.     

GENDER AND TASK IN THE DETERMINATION OF SPATIAL COGNITIVE PERFORMANCE

A variety of sex differences in spatial cognitive performance have been documented. However, factors other than those specifically related to gender and cognition per se, such as the perceived spatial character of given tasks, may contribute to such differences. In the present experiments, spatial memory and mental image rotation tasks were presented to female and male adults. The task formats or instructions were varied to emphasize or deemphasize the spatial character of the tasks. Highly "spatial" instructions or format significantly depressed performance on spatial tasks for women but not for men. "Nonspatial" instructions or format, within which the spatial character of the task was not explicit, resulted in no significant differences between the performances of women and men on either type of task. These findings indicate that instructional or format effects relating to the purported "spatial" character of a given task may significantly influence the relative performance of women and men.     

Gender differences in episodic memory

The relationship between gender and memory has been largely neglected by research, despite occasional studies reporting gender differences in episodic memory performance. The present study examined potential gender differences in episodic memory, semantic memory, primary memory, and priming. Five hundred thirty women and 470 men, randomly sampled from the city of Umeå, Sweden, 35–80 years of age, participated in the study. There were no differences between men and women with regard to age or education, or on a measure of global intellectual functioning. As has been demonstrated previously, men outperformed women on a visuospatial task and women outperformed men on tests of verbal fluency. In addition, the results demonstrated that women consistently performed at a higher level than did men on the episodic memory tasks, although there were no differences between men and women on the tasks assessing semantic memory, primary memory, or priming. The women’s higher level of performance on the episodic memory tasks could not be fully explained by their higher verbal ability.     

Because difficulty is not the same for everyone: the impact of complexity in working memory is associated with cannabinoid 1 receptor genetic variation in young adults

Individual differences in working memory ability are mainly revealed when a demanding challenge is imposed. Here, we have associated cannabinoid 1 (CB1) receptor genetic variation rs2180619 (AA, AG, GG), which is located in a potential CNR1 regulatory sequence, with performance in working memory. Two-hundred and nine Mexican-mestizo healthy young participants (89 women, 120 men, mean age: 23.26 years, SD?=?2.85) were challenged to solve a medium (2-back) vs. a high (3-back) difficulty N-back tasks. All subjects responded as expected, performance was better with the medium than the high demand task version, but no differences were found among genotypes while performing each working memory (WM) task. However, the cost of the level of complexity in N-back paradigm was double for GG subjects than for AA subjects. It is noteworthy that an additive-dosage allele relation was found for G allele in terms of cost of level of complexity. These genetic variation results support that the endocannabinoid system, evaluated by rs2180619 polymorphism, is involved in WM ability in humans.     

Age-related differences in the elderly in a spatial recognition task

ABSTRACT

Spatial memory is a cognitive ability which declines with ageing thus showing changes in some process such as the use of allocentric strategies. These age-related changes in spatial orientation suggest that this skill could be an adequate marker of cognitive decline. Many tasks used in investigation to assess spatial memory demand a participant’s active role, which involves that the navigational experience is different for everyone. In this study, the Almeria Spatial Memory Recognition Test (ASMRT), a test based on a recognition paradigm, was used to offer the same experience with the environment. The aim of this research was to determine if the ASMRT is suitable to be applied in the elderly and detect spatial memory differences as one age. The ASMRT and other neuropsychological tests were applied in a sample aged between 50and 79 years. Results revealed a decrease in the ASMRT performance by the older group. No gender differences were found. Performance in attention and visuospatial working memory tests revealed some correlations with the ASMRT performance. In conclusion, this study demonstrates that 70–79-year-old participants clearly show age-related changes in spatial memory. Thanks to its simplicity the ASMRT could be used as a screening test in medical practice.     

Gender Differences in Spatial Task Performance as a Function of Speed or Accuracy Orientation

Performance differences in spatial abilities as a function of gender may be modified by practice and relevant background experiences, as well as by directions given in laboratory situations. We examined whether a focus on speed or accuracy influenced performance in various spatial domains, using several different scoring techniques. Men and women from a small, predominantly White private college completed tasks of spatial perception, spatial visualization, and mental rotation under one of three conditions: speed-emphasis, accuracy-emphasis, or control. Participants also provided information concerning experiences pertinent to spatial ability. Results revealed relative parity between men and women on tasks of spatial visualization and spatial perception; speed/accuracy orientation did not alter these findings. Men outperformed women on mental rotation, but only when scored in a strict manner and when explicitly told to focus on accuracy, but not when directional emphasis was absent or geared toward speed. Self-reported background in math, sports, and the arts was unrelated to performance. The results are discussed in terms of women's efficacy beliefs about performing tasks explicitly designated as spatial in nature.     

Multisensory integration affects visuo-spatial working memory

In the present study, we investigate how spatial attention, driven by unisensory and multisensory cues, can bias the access of information into visuo-spatial working memory (VSWM). In a series of four experiments, we compared the effectiveness of spatially-nonpredictive visual, auditory, or audiovisual cues in capturing participants' spatial attention towards a location where to-be-remembered visual stimuli were or were not presented (cued/uncued trials, respectively). The results suggest that the effect of peripheral visual cues in biasing the access of information into VSWM depend on the size of the attentional focus, while auditory cues did not have direct effects in biasing VSWM. Finally, spatially congruent multisensory cues showed an enlarged attentional effect in VSWM as compared to unimodal visual cues, as a likely consequence of multisensory integration. This latter result sheds new light on the interplay between spatial attention and VSWM, pointing to the special role exerted by multisensory (audiovisual) cues.