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Visual working memory continues to develop through adolescence

The capacity of visual working memory (VWM) refers to the amount of visual information that can be maintained in mind at once, readily accessible for ongoing tasks. In healthy young adults, the capacity limit of VWM corresponds to about three simple objects. While some researchers argued that VWM ca...

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Autores principales: Isbell, Elif, Fukuda, Keisuke, Neville, Helen J., Vogel, Edward K.
Formato: Online Artículo Texto
Lenguaje:English
Publicado: Frontiers Media S.A. 2015
Materias:
Acceso en línea:https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4443298/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/26074849
http://dx.doi.org/10.3389/fpsyg.2015.00696
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author Isbell, Elif
Fukuda, Keisuke
Neville, Helen J.
Vogel, Edward K.
author_facet Isbell, Elif
Fukuda, Keisuke
Neville, Helen J.
Vogel, Edward K.
author_sort Isbell, Elif
collection PubMed
description The capacity of visual working memory (VWM) refers to the amount of visual information that can be maintained in mind at once, readily accessible for ongoing tasks. In healthy young adults, the capacity limit of VWM corresponds to about three simple objects. While some researchers argued that VWM capacity becomes adult-like in early years of life, others claimed that the capacity of VWM continues to develop beyond middle childhood. Here we assessed whether VWM capacity reaches adult levels in adolescence. Using an adaptation of the visual change detection task, we measured VWM capacity estimates in 13-year-olds, 16-year-olds, and young adults. We tested whether the capacity estimates observed in early or later years of adolescence were comparable to the estimates obtained from adults. Our results demonstrated that the capacity of VWM continues to develop throughout adolescence, not reaching adult levels even in 16-year-olds. These findings suggest that VWM capacity displays a prolonged development, similar to the protracted trajectories observed in various other aspects of cognition.
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spelling pubmed-44432982015-06-12 Visual working memory continues to develop through adolescence Isbell, Elif Fukuda, Keisuke Neville, Helen J. Vogel, Edward K. Front Psychol Psychology The capacity of visual working memory (VWM) refers to the amount of visual information that can be maintained in mind at once, readily accessible for ongoing tasks. In healthy young adults, the capacity limit of VWM corresponds to about three simple objects. While some researchers argued that VWM capacity becomes adult-like in early years of life, others claimed that the capacity of VWM continues to develop beyond middle childhood. Here we assessed whether VWM capacity reaches adult levels in adolescence. Using an adaptation of the visual change detection task, we measured VWM capacity estimates in 13-year-olds, 16-year-olds, and young adults. We tested whether the capacity estimates observed in early or later years of adolescence were comparable to the estimates obtained from adults. Our results demonstrated that the capacity of VWM continues to develop throughout adolescence, not reaching adult levels even in 16-year-olds. These findings suggest that VWM capacity displays a prolonged development, similar to the protracted trajectories observed in various other aspects of cognition. Frontiers Media S.A. 2015-05-27 /pmc/articles/PMC4443298/ /pubmed/26074849 http://dx.doi.org/10.3389/fpsyg.2015.00696 Text en Copyright © 2015 Isbell, Fukuda, Neville and Vogel. http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/ This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (CC BY). The use, distribution or reproduction in other forums is permitted, provided the original author(s) or licensor are credited and that the original publication in this journal is cited, in accordance with accepted academic practice. No use, distribution or reproduction is permitted which does not comply with these terms.
spellingShingle Psychology
Isbell, Elif
Fukuda, Keisuke
Neville, Helen J.
Vogel, Edward K.
Visual working memory continues to develop through adolescence
title Visual working memory continues to develop through adolescence
title_full Visual working memory continues to develop through adolescence
title_fullStr Visual working memory continues to develop through adolescence
title_full_unstemmed Visual working memory continues to develop through adolescence
title_short Visual working memory continues to develop through adolescence
title_sort visual working memory continues to develop through adolescence
topic Psychology
url https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4443298/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/26074849
http://dx.doi.org/10.3389/fpsyg.2015.00696
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