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The Relations Between Early Working Memory Abilities and Later Developing Reading Skills: A Longitudinal Study From Kindergarten to Fifth Grade
Author(s) -
Nevo Einat,
BarKochva Irit
Publication year - 2015
Publication title -
mind, brain, and education
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 0.624
H-Index - 35
eISSN - 1751-228X
pISSN - 1751-2271
DOI - 10.1111/mbe.12084
Subject(s) - cognitive psychology , working memory , short term memory , reading (process) , psychology , visual memory , baddeley's model of working memory , orthography , reading comprehension , semantic memory , recall , cognition , linguistics , philosophy , neuroscience
This study investigated the relations of early working‐memory abilities (phonological and visual‐spatial short‐term memory [ STM ] and complex memory and episodic buffer memory) and later developing reading skills. Sixty Hebrew‐speaking children were followed from kindergarten through Grade 5. Working memory was tested in kindergarten and reading in Grades 1, 2, and 5. All memory measures, but phonological STM , correlated with reading up to Grade 5. Regression analyses (with intelligence quotient controlled) demonstrated that phonological complex memory predicted all reading skills in Grade 1, and accuracy in Grade 2. The rather understudied visual‐spatial memory predicted comprehension in Grades 2 ( STM ) and 5 (complex memory). The results point to an important role of the phonological complex memory in early assessment, and suggest a long‐lasting role of early visual‐spatial memory in predicting variance in reading. Whether this role of the visual‐spatial memory is unique to the Hebrew orthography because of its visual features requires, however, further investigation.