Research Catalog

Title

Working memory capacity / Nelson Cowan.

Author

Cowan, Nelson

Publication

New York : Psychology Press, c2005.

Items in the Library & Off-site

Details

Description

ix, 246 p. : ill.; 24 cm.

Series Statement

Essays in cognitive psychology

Subject

Short-term memory

Bibliography (note)

• Includes bibliographical references (p. 213-231) and indexes.

Contents

The problem of capacity limits. Working memory capacity and the full brain ; Broad and narrow definitions of capacity ; In search of capacity measures ; Three attitudes: naive constancy, relativity, and refined constancy ; History of working-memory research: alternative terms and concepts ; History of research on immediate-memory capacity -- The present theoretical approach. A more general level of analysis ; Embedded processes ; Formation of new links in working memory ; Capacity limit of the attentional focus ; Resource sharing between storage and processing ; Flexibility in the scope of attention ; Some unresolved issues of the present approach -- Capacity limits and the measurement of chunking. Past approaches to the measurement of chunking ; Chunks, associations, templates, and retrieval structures ; Demonstrations of a constant capacity in verbal recall ; The domains of capacity and of time -- Capacity limits in unstructured materials. The review by Broadbent (1975) ; The review by Cowan (2001) ; Continuing evidence ; Chunk limits and feature-content limits -- Other views of capacity limits. The seven-item view ; The one-memory view ; The unlimited-memory view ; The multiple-capacities view ; The view of separate storage and processing limits ; The task-specific capacity view ; The one-chunk view ; The one-chunk center, four-chunk surround view ; The two-chunk view ; The binding-limit view -- Why the capacity limit? Efficient causes (determiners) of capacity limits ; Formal causes (models) of capacity limits ; Material causes (mechanisms) of capacity limits ; Final causes (functions) of capacity limits ; Reconciliation between types of causation -- Epilogue: working-memory capacity, life, death, and cars.

Call Number

JSE 10-336

ISBN

• 184169097X (hc : alk. paper)
• 9781841690971 (hc : alk. paper)

LCCN

2005007015

OCLC

58468398

Author

Cowan, Nelson.

Title

Working memory capacity / Nelson Cowan.

Imprint

New York : Psychology Press, c2005.

Series

Essays in cognitive psychology

Bibliography

Includes bibliographical references (p. 213-231) and indexes.

Research Call Number

JSE 10-336