title: Working memory span development: a time-based resource-sharing model account.
abstract: The time-based resource-sharing model (P. Barrouillet, S. Bernardin, & V. Camos, 2004) assumes that during complex working memory span tasks, attention is frequently and surreptitiously switched from processing to reactivate decaying memory traces before their complete loss. Three experiments involving children from 5 to 14 years of age investigated the role of this reactivation process in developmental differences in working memory spans. Though preschoolers seem to adopt a serial control without any attempt to refresh stored items when engaged in processing, the reactivation process is efficient from age 7 onward and increases in efficiency until late adolescence, underpinning a sizable part of developmental differences.
authors.affiliation: Department of Psychology, Universite de Geneve, Geneve, Switzerland. Pierre.Barrouillet@pse.unige.ch
authors.forename: Pierre
authors.initials: P
authors.lastname: Barrouillet
authors.forename: Nathalie
authors.initials: N
authors.lastname: Gavens
authors.forename: Evie
authors.initials: E
authors.lastname: Vergauwe
authors.forename: Vinciane
authors.initials: V
authors.lastname: Gaillard
authors.forename: Valérie
authors.initials: V
authors.lastname: Camos
mesh_terms: D000293:Adolescent; D000367:Age Factors; D001288:Attention; D002648:Child; D002657:Child Development; D002675:Child, Preschool; D005260:Female; D006801:Humans; D008297:Male; D008570:Memory, Short-Term; D010364:Pattern Recognition, Visual; D011214:Practice, Psychological; D011930:Reaction Time; D012153:Retention, Psychology; D012691:Serial Learning