Short-term memory (STM) consists of two major components. The first is an active articulatory loop, responsible for the internal articulation of verbal items that permits the recycling and continuous refreshing of information. The second involves a passive phonological store into which auditory speech information enters directly. / The first part of this thesis consists of a general evaluation of the cognitive impairments in three brain-damaged patients, who show a similar reduction in their auditory span, related to the components of STM. The word length effect, the phonological similarity effect and the primacy and recency effects are examined under normal conditions and under articulatory suppression. / The second part of this work is based on a mathematical model from which derived three variables: "a" and "b" representing the internal rehearsal mechanism, and "T" which is the temporal capacity limiting the operation of auditory short-term memory. A double dissociation was found between the articulatory mechanism and the temporal capacity, and a further one between two different processes within the articulatory mechanism. "a" reflecting the activation and recovery of an entire chunk, and "b" the articulation of syllables.
| Identifer | oai:union.ndltd.org:LACETR/oai:collectionscanada.gc.ca:QMM.59609 |
| Date | January 1988 |
| Creators | Durand, Guylaine M. (Guylaine Marie) |
| Publisher | McGill University |
| Source Sets | Library and Archives Canada ETDs Repository / Centre d'archives des thèses électroniques de Bibliothèque et Archives Canada |
| Language | French |
| Detected Language | English |
| Type | Electronic Thesis or Dissertation |
| Format | application/pdf |
| Coverage | Master of Science (Department of Neurology and Neurosurgery.) |
| Rights | All items in eScholarship@McGill are protected by copyright with all rights reserved unless otherwise indicated. |
| Relation | alephsysno: 001233013, proquestno: AAIMM64086, Theses scanned by UMI/ProQuest. |
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