Memory Disorders & Development

Memory Disorders & Development

1. Working Memory

   • Key Features: Storage & Manipulation Components: Phonological loop, Visuo-spatial sketchpad, Episodic buffer, Central Excutive
   • Associated with academic and cognitive performance
     • Visuo-spatial memory strongly linked with performance in Mathematics and Science
     • Deficits of WM found in children with learning difficulties in Literacy and Mathematics
   • Learning difficulties
     • Arise from WM constraints operating at the point of learning
     • Children with marked imairments of WM have problems with remembering complex instructions, concurrent processing, storage demands, multi-level tasks -> cause of learning difficulties
     • Inability to store and manipulate information in WM -> WM bottleneck for learning
     • Children with low IQ scores & moderate/severe WM impairments experience more pervasive learning difficulties
   • Impairments of WM result in several characteristic classroom failures: Forgetting instructions, place-keeping erros in complex tasks, failure to meet simultaneous processing & storage-demands

2. Verbal STM memory

   • Language Learning
     • Highly linked to learning of sound patterns of new words in native language over early childhoold & second language at all ages
     • Children with poor verbal memory skills have specific impairments in the process of learning phonological structures of new vocabulary items, thus poor vocabulary acquisition

3. Disorders

   • Down Syndrome
     • Marked deficits with verbal STM
     • Problem with subvocal rehearsal, which is crucial in maintaining phonological representations in STM & preventing decay
     • Low verbal memory reflects inadequacies in storage of phonological material in STM
     • Intact phonological loop is important for LT learning of sound structures -> slower vocabulary acquisition
   • Williams Syndrome
     • Severe deficits in aspects of spatial cognition including pattern construction, drawing & visual processing
     • Visuo-spatial STM supports LT within this modality, particularly in learning new spatial routes -> impaired visuo-spatial learning abilities
   • Attentional Disorders (ADHD)
     • Impairments of executive functioning, particularly in tasks relating to inhibition or prepotent responses. Difficulty with self-control of actions and verbalization. May manifest as hyperactivity or extreme impulsivity
     • Subtle impairments can impact organizing and planning ability (developed only later in childhood)
     • Inattention may stem from inability to hold mental representations active and use them to guide behaviour; impairment of working memory
   • Specific Language Impairment
     • Impairments of both STM & WM
     • Deficits in nonword repetition
     • Delayed/disordered language development
     • Deficits in output phonology & articulation, subtle auditory processing problems
     • Verbal WM deficits likely to contribute to substantial learning difficulties in literacy and mathematics