Enhancing Working Memory

Enhancing Working Memory Through Brian Training

When examining memory it is known that the more efficient memory can be, the better. There are things we want to remember and others not so much. Some people struggle with remembering things. Some people struggle with the retrieval of memories and this is apparent throughout life. Exploring memory, short-term and long-term one may find that our working memory holds importance. Short-term memory has modalities that give some insight to the functions and systems providing us understanding of the process. Long-term memory also holds truths to the systems and processes allowing one to keep and hold wanted/unwanted memories. Working memory however is vital to both of these functions and without

Smith and Kosslyn (2007) define memory as a set of representations and processes by which information is encoded, consolidated, and retrieved. (p. 538). Models have been developed to show processes such as short-term storage that allows for problem solving and for how memory is processed from sensory input to long-term storage. Although, there are many representations of these types of processes, only a few will be discussed in this paper. As credit is due to all the theories and tasks that have been completed to give evidence that these processes do exist; at the present day moment experts still are not sure exactly how our brain works. Experiments done to study the processes built evidence neurologically that parts of the memory systems do show activity in parts of the brain. Making many of these modalities and processes valid and reliable when considering the main sections of memory. Consider the two main sections of memory: short term memory and long-term memory. Short-term memory and long-term memory both have been examined through machinery such as a Positron Emission Tomography (PET) scan to prove that these processes do show through brain activity thus increasing our understanding of memory. Let us begin by further discussing long-term memory then short-term memory before attempting the contrivance of working

According to “…George Miller, an early and influential cognitive theorist, provided detailed evidence that the capacity for short-term memory information storage is limited.” (Smith and Kosslyn, 2007, p 243). Miller found through memorization tests that people have a capacity to remember seven numbers (digits) at a time plus or minus two digits. Miller didn’t account for chunking, which is basically grouping numbers so that there are less actual individual digits to remember. This is how one can remember a social security number, telephone numbers, and/or credit card numbers. If a person already knows an area code (e.g. 808) for a telephone number it would leave room for you to chuck that as one representation. A person could remember the rest of the telephone number individually or by chunking. Also, with a telephone number there is a dash that helps a person chuck it into two parts (e.g. 729-7316). Depending on rehearsal you could remember this number temporarily so that you can dial it, write it down, or rehearsal it enough so that you store it in long-term memory. This process contributes to making representations thus encoding a memory to draw from in a future time. “Encoding: the process by which information or perceived events are transformed into a memory representations.” (Smith and Kosslyn, 2007, p 535). View this example, take these numbers 5060, instead of remembering these numbers as