![]() ![]() The visuospatial sketchpad holds and manipulates information of the visual and spatial variety (as you probably could’ve guessed). For a new college student, this means that repetitive remembering (in the phonological loop) creates stronger memories and stronger bonds between related information. According to a recent psychological study, adults with normally functioning memory systems have more durability for verbal/auditory information than they do for visual information (4). If you cut open your brain, this is exactly what it looks like actually.įirst is the phonological loop, where verbal and auditory information is held and processed. Within working memory, there are three subdivisions of the processes memories and information here can go through: the phonological loop, the visuo-spatial sketchpad, and the central executive (1). What practicing different tasks as a student (be it arithmetic, unit tests, etc.) does is it makes it easier to connect different concepts in your memory, binding them together, simplifying remembering bigger chunks of information (2). To make it even simpler, this means that practice could actually mean perfect. Yes, it sounds really fancy, but it just means when a skill or procedure is mastered so well that it no longer requires conscious, effortful cognitive processing (4). To help explain this, there’s this psychological term called automaticity. ![]() We’re all in the same boat when it comes to exams we “forgot” to study for.īut, and all of your previous teachers may have been onto something here, the basic idea behind making working memory work more in your favor is: PRACTICE. The results of recent psychological studies indicate that in high pressure situations (like a college-level test or final exam), performance was almost identical between high capacity working memory participants and low capacity working memory participants (4). Yes Doc Brown, your capacity for memory really is that exciting.Īnd, here’s the kicker, there seems to be no way to truly improve or expand your working memory space, if you have been cursed with a lower working memory capacity.īut don’t go jumping for joy just yet if you believe you’ve been blessed with a high capacity in working memory. This essentially means that some processes and reasoning tasks use up more available space in working memory, leaving less space for other tasks. But, generally, students can be sorted into the categories of high capacity working memory and low capacity working memory (3). There’s no way to officially determine the amount of cap space available for working memory (it’s not like you can calculate that a particular person has 1.21 gigawatts worth of memory space). It’s the general assumption that there’s no limit to the amount of memories we can contain, right? Well, working memory actually does have a capacity (2). Now, there’s a trick with working memory. A simple example of the function of working memory is when you solve a double-digit addition problem in your head you have to hold onto the remainder of the single digits added together while you solve the rest of the equation. Working memory is very similar to the familiar idea of short-term memory, but working memory is the portion of the memory processes where either new information, or information pulled from long-term memory, is manipulated and processed (1). Well, here’s the thing, that feeling that your brain is full, you have this concept called working memory to thank for that. It feels like your brain is full you can’t possibly fit any more information in there. So you get to college and it feels like your brain is going to explode with all of the tasks you have to complete in addition to actually attending and paying attention in class. All those study methods and habits you thought worked so well don’t exactly compute with the oodles of homework, tests, and term projects piled on your plate. No matter where you go or what major you have, college is worlds away from any sort of high school education. You think that because high school was such a breeze that you must have stellar study habits and practices, right? You must have it all figured out already, right? ![]()
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