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Working Memory and Learning Difficulties

Dr Joni HolmesMRC Cognition and Brain Sciences UnitDyslexia Action Summer Conference, 28th June 2012

Introduction to working memory and its development

Poor working memory as a risk factor for learning difficulties

Interventions

Overview

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WM: Key featuresCapacity to hold material in mind and manipulate as necessary for brief period

Mental workspace

Limited in capacity - varies between individuals

Catastrophic loss

Impervious to environmental factors such as SES, ethnicity (Engel, Dos Santos & Gathercole, 2008)

WM: DevelopmentWM capacity (amount of information we can hold in mind) varies across the lifespan

WM: DevelopmentIn childhood, capacity increases steadily from 4 to 14 yearsBUT great variability in capacity between children of the same age

Mean scores on listening recall test from WMTB-C as a function of age, with 10th and 90th centiles

WM and Developmental DisordersDeficits in WM are a common feature in many acquired and genetic developmental disorders of learningADHD (Martinussen & Tannock, 2006)Reading difficulties (Swanson, 2003)Mathematical difficulties (Geary et al., 2004)Specific Language Impairment (Archibald & Gathercole, 2007)Dyslexia (Jeffries & Everatt, 2003, 2004) Down syndrome (Jarrold, Baddeley & Hewes, 1999)Williams syndrome (Jarrold, Baddeley, Hewes & Phillips, 2001)

WM and Developmental DisordersIllustration of atypical WM development in ADHD

WM development in childhood for individuals with ADHD from Westerberg et al. (2004)

Visuo-spatial working memory: a sensitive measurement of cognitive deficits in ADHD. Child Neuropsychology 10 (3) 155-61.

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WM and Developmental DisordersWM scores of children with ADHD compared to an age-matched comparison group

From Holmes et al. (2012)

WM as a primary cause for slow learning

Deficits are common in many developmental disorders, but

Poor working memory is a high risk factor for slow rates of learning that:

warrants detection in its own right

requires and benefits from intervention

WM as a predictor of specificlearning difficulties

46 children aged 7-11 with SEN in reading (Gathercole et al., 2006)

Completed a wide range of cognitive assessmentsIQ, short-term memory, WM, phonological awareness, maths, languageStatistical analysis to compare these skills as predictors of reading and maths performance

WM as a predictor of specificlearning difficulties

Reading performancePredicted only by working memory and language (not IQ or phonological awareness)

Maths performancePredicted only by working memory

WM as a function of attainmentWorking memory scores as a function of maths and English attainment at Key Stage 2 SATs (from Gathercole et al., 2004)

Not just SEN, but across the board WM related to attainment and WM scores in deficit range for children with the lowest attainment in reading and math and KS212

Characteristics of childrenwith poor WM

Observations of over 300 children with poor working memory function, reported in

Gathercole, Lamont & Alloway (2006)Gathercole & Alloway (2008)Gathercole, Alloway, Kirkwood, Elliott, Holmes & Hilton (2008)

Characteristics of childrenwith poor WMPoor academic progressMore than 80% of children with poor working memory fail to achieve expected levels of attainment in both reading and maths

Characteristics of childrenwith poor WMPoor academic progressReserved in groups (normal social integration)

Ross (6 years) is a reserved and quiet child who tends not to volunteer responses and rarely answers direct questions, particularly in the whole-class situation. He is sometimes becomes more vocal when working in small groups although he isnt necessarily discussing the task in hand

Characteristics of childrenwith poor WMPoor academic progressReserved in groups (normal social integration)Difficulties in following instructions

Put your sheets on the green table, arrow cards in the packet, put your pencil away and come and sit on the carpet. John (6 years) moved his sheets as requested, but failed to do anything else. When he realized that the rest of the class was seated on the carpet, he went and joined them, leaving his arrow cards and pencil on the table.

Characteristics of childrenwith poor WMPoor academic progressReserved in groups (normal social integration)Difficulties in following instructionsPlace-keeping difficulties

When the teacher wrote on the board Monday 11th November and, underneath, The Market, which was the title of the piece of work, Nathan lost his place in the laborious attempt to copy the words down letter by letter, writing moNemarket

Characteristics of childrenwith poor WMPoor academic progressReserved in groups (normal social integration)Difficulties in following instructionsPlace-keeping difficultiesShort attention span and distractibility

Adam (5 years) struggles to maintain attention, particularly during whole-class teaching when the pupils join together on the carpet. Hence, he sits directly in front of the teacher and is frequently prompted to sit correctly and to pay attention as he regularly fidgets, looks around the classroom and distracts other children near him.

Why do children with poorWM struggle to learn?

Learning is a step-by-step process, based on successes in individual learning activities.

Children with WM impairments often fail in the classroom because the WM loads of each activity are excessive for them.

WM failure leads to inattentive behaviour, simply because the child forgets what s/he is doing.

This leads to frequent lost learning opportunities, and consequently slow rates of learning

Interventions

Can WM problems be overcome?

Classroom-based support

WM training

1. Classroom-based support

Be aware of the warning signs of WM failure Monitor the childReduce amount of information to be storedReduce difficulty of processingBe prepared to re-present important information Encourage the use of memory aids Help the child to use strategies

1. Classroom-based support:EvaluationTeachers say:relatively easy to implement as they can work with existing curriculum activitiesenabled them to understand that many task failures are due to forgetting the child benefits from working within own capacity, with greater rates of task success

For more information:Gathercole SE & Alloway TP (2008). Working memory and learning: A practical guide for teachers. Sage Publishing

Elliott, J., Gathercole, S.E., Alloway, T.P., Holmes, J., & Kirkwood, H. (2010). An Evaluation of a Classroom-Based Intervention to Help Overcome Working Memory Difficulties and Improve Long-Term Academic Achievement. Journal of Cognitive Education and Psychology, 9, 227-250

2. WM trainingSurge in developing methods to improve WM to overcome adverse consequences

Number of studies have now demonstrated that repeated practice on WM tasks consistently boosts performance on non-trained WM tasks across a range of populationsArray of WM tasks (e.g. Klingberg et al., 2005; Holmes et al., 2009)N-back paradigm (e.g. Dahlin et al., 2008; Jaeggi et al., 2008; Schweizer, Dalgliesh et al., in press)

2. WM trainingCogmed Working Memory Training Pearson

Computerised memory training programGame-style environment designed to train working memory Train on working memory tasks for 25 sessions over a 6-8 week periodAdaptive: individual works at span level

2. WM trainingTraining environment

2. WM trainingStills from two training tasks

2. WM trainingChildren with ADHD (Holmes et al., 2010)

25 children with clinical diagnosis of ADHD-C

Assessed off medication, on medication, after training and 6 mth follow up (medicated)

IQ and WM

Training children with ADHD (Holmes, Gathercole, Place, Dunning, Hilton & Elliott, 2010)

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Training children with ADHD (Holmes, Gathercole, Place, Dunning, Hilton & Elliott, 2010)*

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Training children with ADHD (Holmes, Gathercole, Place, Dunning, Hilton & Elliott, 2010)*****

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Training children with ADHD (Holmes, Gathercole, Place, Dunning, Hilton & Elliott, 2010)******No impact on IQ

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2. WM trainingChildren with poor WM (Holmes et al., 2010)

42 children, 8-11 years, with low WM (scores