Working Memory, Thought, and Action

by Baddeley, Alan

• ISBN13: 9780198528012
• ISBN10: 0198528019
• Edition: 1st
• Format: Paperback
• Copyright: 2007-05-17
• Publisher: Oxford University Press

Summary

Working Memory, Thought, and Action is the magnum opus of one of the most influential cognitive psychologists of the past fifty years.

Author Biography

Alan Baddeley succeeded Donald Broadbent as Director of the APU in Cambridge. Some 20 years later he moved to Bristol University. He is now at University of York where he has re-established his old collaboration with Graham Hitch. His interests are in human memory in general and working memory more specifically, and in combining basic and applied research. He is a Fellow of the Royal Society, of the European Academy and is a foreign member of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences. He has received the APA Distinguished Scientific Contribution Award, the Aristotle Prize for contributions to European Psychology, and was awarded the CBE for contributions to the study of memory.

Table of Contents

Preface	p. xi
Acknowledgements	p. xvii
Introduction and overview	p. 1
Some history	p. 2
Multicomponent working memory	p. 5
The multicomponent model	p. 7
Conclusions	p. 13
Why do we need a phonological loop?	p. 15
The evolutionary relevance of the loop	p. 15
Language acquisition	p. 16
Sublexical short-term memory	p. 21
The problem of serial order	p. 25
Chaining models	p. 26
Contextual models	p. 27
The phonological loop: challenges and growing points	p. 35
Nairne's critique	p. 35
The word length effect	p. 38
Disrupting the phonological loop	p. 49
The irrelevant speech effect	p. 51
The phonological loop: an overview	p. 60
Conclusion	p. 62
Visuospatial short-term memory	p. 63
The case for a separating visuospatial and verbal working memory	p. 63
Fractionating visuospatial working memory	p. 64
Memory for spatial location	p. 65
Object-based short-term memory	p. 67
Sequential storage in visuospatial short-term memory	p. 73
Separating the threads	p. 77
Conclusions	p. 83
Imagery and visuospatial working memory	p. 85
Visuospatial coding and verbal memory	p. 86
Modelling the visuospatial sketchpad	p. 91
Visual imagery	p. 94
Conclusions	p. 100
Recency, retrieval and the constant ratio rule	p. 103
Recency in free recall	p. 103
The constant ratio rule	p. 105
Theories of the recency effect	p. 108
The evolutionary function of recency	p. 114
Fractionating the central executive	p. 117
The central executive as rag-bag	p. 118
Executive processes and the frontal lobes	p. 119
Working memory and executive processes	p. 122
Focusing the limited capacity	p. 124
Task switching and the central executive	p. 129
Division of attention as an executive skill	p. 133
Conclusions	p. 138
Long-term memory and the episodic buffer	p. 139
Some reductionist views	p. 139
Some skeletons in the working memory cupboard	p. 141
The episodic buffer	p. 148
Exploring the episodic buffer	p. 157
Binding in visual working memory	p. 157
Binding in memory for prose	p. 160
Some implications	p. 169
Individual differences and working memory span	p. 175
The psychometric tradition	p. 175
The concept of intelligence	p. 176
Individual differences in working memory	p. 181
What does working memory span measure?	p. 184
What limits working memory span?	p. 189
The speed hypothesis	p. 189
The resource pool hypothesis	p. 190
The inhibition hypothesis	p. 192
Components of working memory	p. 198
Fractionating the central executive	p. 203
Working memory and education	p. 205
Conclusion	p. 209
Neuroimaging working memory	p. 211
Positron emission tomography (PET)	p. 211
Functional magnetic resonance imagery (fMRI)	p. 213
Electroencephalography (EEG)	p. 213
Other techniques	p. 214
The naming of parts	p. 216
What have we learned from imaging working memory?	p. 217
Imaging the central executive	p. 224
Meta-analysis of executive processing	p. 228
Imaging retrieval processes	p. 230
Some conclusions	p. 231
Working memory and social behaviour	p. 235
What controls behaviour?	p. 235
Habits, schemata and deterministic control	p. 236
The sense of agency	p. 242
Working memory and self-control	p. 246
Conclusions	p. 255
Working memory and emotion 1: fear and craving	p. 257
Cognition in extreme emotion	p. 258
Clinical studies of anxiety and cognition	p. 265
Modelling the impact of anxiety and cognition	p. 269
Addiction and craving	p. 272
Conclusion	p. 275
Working memory and emotion II: depression and the wellsprings of action	p. 277
Comparing the effects of anxiety and depression	p. 277
Psychological theories of depression	p. 284
The wellsprings of action	p. 286
Working memory and depression	p. 289
Emotion and the multicomponent model	p. 293
Emotion: a broader view	p. 295
Conclusions	p. 300
Consciousness	p. 301
A pragmatic approach to consciousness	p. 301
Core consciousness	p. 302
Consciousness under anaesthesia	p. 304
Conscious control and the global workspace hypothesis	p. 306
A neural basis for cognitive workspace	p. 309
Consciousness and working memory	p. 314
The multilevel control of action	p. 317
Implicit control of action	p. 317
A model of motor control	p. 323
Implications of motor control for working memory	p. 332
Conclusions	p. 334
Working memory in context: life, the universe and everything	p. 335
An evolutionary perspective	p. 336
Some philosophical implications	p. 339
Epilogue	p. 348
References	p. 351
Index	p. 405
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