Working Memory And Mental Addition And Subtraction

The vast majority of empirical work on working memory and mental additionand subtraction had been done within the three-component model proposed byBaddeley&Hitch(1974). Cognitive scientists still argued much on the issue whetheror not the three systems of working memory exert during the mental arithmeticprocess. Further researches on these issues are supposed to be discussed.This dissertation tends to explore different presentation style, the relationshipsbetween working memory, different surface forms and different difficulty of mentaladdition and subtraction questions through behavioral experiment. Especiallyfocusing on how the components of working memory have influenced the mentalarithmetic process.50postgraduate participated in the screening test of mentaladdition and subtraction. According to their scores，the first50subjects were dividedin to five groups randomly. One group (the control group)were asked to completemental addition and subtraction only, the others(the experimental ones)were requirednot only to take mental addition and subtraction tests(the primary task)，but also tocomplete another task(the secondary task， i.e. tapping， unattended pictures，articulatory suppression，or random interval repetition)，which would interfere withindividual component of working memory.The result of these experiments indicate that working memory and differentpresentation style, different surface forms and different difficulty are both importantfactors that will influence mental addition and subtraction.For the questions presentedvisually, the first difficulty of the complex arithmetic: the central executive system isinvolved in mental addition and subtraction. The second difficulty of the complexarithmetic: the spatial component of visual spatial sketchpad and the central executivesystem have main effect; But for the presentation styles of audio, the phonologicalloop, the visual spatial sketchpad and the central executive system are involved inmental arithmetic. In addition, the reaction time of the presentation styles of audio islonger than the questions presented visually, and the former seems to be moresensitive to the interferences from the secondary tasks.