Working Memory

Working Memory

Working memory is a temporary storage, whereas long-term memory is permanent. Although they reside in one brain, they are separate systems.

British scientists Alan Baddeley has done a lot of research to characterize the many facets of working memory. He conceived of working memory as a temporary workspace, like a desktop, with lots of items on it. Working memory is a temporary storage space in your brain. Its job is to bring information into your conscious awareness and then hold it for a short period of time, usually to support some activity you have chosen to engage in.

For example, you use working memory when you decide to call someone, inserting the phone number into working memory while you punch in the number. You also use it when you are reading, holding pieces of previously exposed text in a temporary buffer while you take in new information. You use it when you are drawing things or when remembering an artistic work someone else drew.

Working memory has a number of complicated associated subsystems, according to Baddeley. There is a subsystem within working memory that mainly processes verbal information. Baddeley calls this the phonological loop neurons of working memory. There is another subsystem that mainly processes visual information, called the visual-spatial sketchpad neurons of working memory. Finally, there is a subsystem in the brain that supervises the work of the other two subsystems, called the central executive. These three components work together in a coordinated fashion to help you read text, see objects, and generally get along in life.

Some researchers believe that working memory can directly affect your fluid intelligence abilities – and for a simple reason: It determines the number of temporary variables you can hold in your head simultaneously. The bigger your capacity, the more you can hold.

This is a skill you need if you are going to attempt to pattern match, solve problems, do abstract reasoning, or use any of the cognitive gadgets that characterize fluid intelligence. Cattell and Horn believe that the many skills involved in fluid intelligence need a fairly robust desktop to function adequately. It's the same space you need to be creative.

The ideas of Cattell and Horn both require memory processing. They say that crystallized intelligence involves long-term memory systems. Fluid intelligence involves short-term memory systems.

The presence of both short-term and long-term memory is another terrific way to show that memory is not a unified concept. The concept is mature enough that we even know some of the neurological systems involved in each. We needed both to survive in the unstable world of the Serengeti.

We have many senses which work together to give us perceptions of reality. Illustration by Elena.