A Study On Working Memory Of Children With Reading Disability

With the development of society, research about psychology and education of child with learning disabilities is emphasized more and more. Reading disability (RD) specially has been a focus because of its being most general. To study the cognitive processing mechanism of children with RD by research formula from cognitive psychology can make this kind of research deeper. This research systematically studies working memory of children with RD. It can refine the relative theories about special child psychology. On the other hand, it also supplies the basic evidences for education and teaching of child with RD.From two respects------working memory capacity and inhibition mechanism,working memory of children with RD is serially studied. There are two experiments designed to text these topics respectively. Experiment 1 uses two techniques: experiment la adopts conceit of short-term memory; Ib by the formula of matched groups with and without RD. Experiment 2 uses the means of error analyses: the blocked design of the listening span task is used in experiment 2a; the mixed design of span task in experiment 2b. The results are demonstrated as following:1. There are differences in short-term and working memory measures between children with RD and CA-matched children. Residual differences in working memory exist between reading groups after partialing out the influence of short-term memory. Deficient working memory of children with RD is partly attributable to efficiencies in the articulatory loop, as well as a general storage system.2. Individuals with and without RD subgrouped by sentence span task are comparable both verbal and visual working memory tasks, that is to say, there is no subgroup X type of WM task interaction. Verbal and Visual systems all obtain resource from Central Executive.3. Compared with the CA-matched children, RD children produce greater intrusions (as well as greater errors). After controlling proactive interference, there are differences between reading groups. RD children have difficulties in access and restraint functions.