Writing,Reading, and Listening Differentially Overload Working Memory Performance Across the Serial Position Curve

Previous research has assumed that writing is a cognitively complex task, but hasnot determined if writing overloads Working Memory more than reading andlistening. To investigate this, participants completed three recall tasks. Thesewere reading lists of words before recalling them, hearing lists of words beforerecalling them, and hearing lists of words and writing them as they heard them,then recalling them. The experiment involved serial recall of lists of 6 words.The hypothesis that fewer words would be recalled overall when writing wassupported. Post-hoc analysis revealed the same pattern of results at individualserial positions (1 to 3). However, there was no difference between the threeconditions at serial position 4, or between listening and writing at positions 5and 6 which were both greater than recall in the reading condition. Thissuggests writing overloads working memory more than reading and listening,particularly in the early serial positions. The results show that writinginterferes with working memory processes and so is not recommended when the goalis to immediately recall information.