The Importance Of Working Memory

Working memory plays an essential role in every individual life. As noted from Santrock (2013) working memory is known to be more active and powerful in modifying information than short term memory, it involves in bringing information to the mind and mentally working and updating it. Without working memory one might not have the ability to carry out complex cognitive tasks such as learning, reasoning and comprehending written and spoken language.

In recent years, much research had suggested that there is interaction between bilingualism and working memory. Many finds that this interaction is mainly due to the experience bilinguals undergo in their daily life. As pointed out by Engel de Abreu (2011), bilinguals need to switch flexibly between languages regularly, they are constantly resolving linguistic conflict by maintaining activation of relevant language in addition to supress interference from non-targeted language, and all these are heavily dependent on working memory. Also, bilingualism being a cognitively demanding experience can modulate the brain development and executive functioning, for this case, working memory being the most important

According to Alloway, Gathercole & Pickering (2006), tests that require the memorisation of sequences of verbal or visuo-spatial information such as Simon tasks are commonly used for measuring children’s working memory. In Simon task, it requires one to “resolve conflicts between an irrelevant response tendency from intended response, switching effectively between types of trial and maintaining rules in working memory” (Clouter, Wilson, Allen, Klein & Eskes, 2015). These mechanisms are involved in working memory processes, therefore Simon tasks has been a proffered tool to measure working memory of young children, it has been used in quite some