Test anxiety and working memory system.
The purpose was to examine the effect of test anxiety on deficits in the articulatory loop in the working memory system. We used a verbal memory task to occupy the articulatory loop and a spatial memory task to occupy the visuospatial scratch pad. 17 highly test-anxious and 19 low-anxiety subjects performed both tasks under an anxiety-inducing situation during which they were observed by a monitor camera. Percentage of correct responses and reaction times were measured as indices of task performance. Highly anxious subjects reported feeling worry and cognitive self-concern more than the low-anxiety group. Highly anxious subjects showed a longer mean reaction time on the verbal memory task than the low-anxiety group. On the spatial memory task there was no difference in quality of performance. This finding might suggest that anxiety such as worry and cognitive self-concern interferes with information processing in the articulatory loop of the working memory system.
Ikeda
M
M
Graduate School of Biosphere Sciences, Hiroshima University, Japan. maki@behavior.ias.hiroshima-u.ac.jp
Iwanaga
M
M
Seiwa
H
H
D000124:Achievement; D000293:Adolescent; D000328:Adult; D001007:Anxiety / Q000523:psychology; D001143:Arousal; D006801:Humans; D007206:Individuality; D011939:Mental Recall; D009949:Orientation; D010364:Pattern Recognition, Visual; D011594:Psychometrics; D011930:Reaction Time; D012649:Self Concept; D013334:Students / Q000523:psychology; D013732:Test Anxiety Scale / Q000706:statistics & numerical data*; D014706:Verbal Learning