The Working Memory Model (WMM) offers a framework for understanding the cognitive processes involved in temporarily storing and manipulating information. Specifically regarding the Landry and Bartling (2011) study on articulatory suppression, the WMM explains the observed impairment in verbal serial recall tasks. By engaging the articulatory control process with a repetitive utterance, the phonological loop, responsible for maintaining verbal information, becomes overloaded. This disruption reduces its capacity to refresh and rehearse the sequence of items, leading to poorer recall performance, particularly for phonologically similar items. This effect is less pronounced for visually presented lists, as these can be encoded directly into the visuo-spatial sketchpad, bypassing the overloaded phonological loop.
Understanding the impact of articulatory suppression on working memory is crucial for appreciating the distinct components and limited capacity of the WMM. It provides evidence for the existence of separate phonological and visuo-spatial stores within working memory. The findings of Landry and Bartling’s research, interpreted through the WMM, have implications for various fields, including cognitive psychology, education, and human-computer interaction. These insights can inform strategies for improving memory performance in different contexts, such as learning new vocabulary or performing complex tasks requiring verbal processing.
