Sebastian and Hernandez-Gil Contemporary Study

Question 1

What is the primary aim of the study?

Answer 1

To investigate the development of the phonological loop in children aged between 5-17 using digit span as a measure of phonological capacity.

Question 2

What age group is the focus of this study and why is it helpful?

Answer 2

Children aged between 5-17.
This age range allows for the examination of developmental changes in phonological capacity.

Question 3

What measure is used to assess phonological capacity in the study?

Answer 3

Digit span.
Digit span refers to the number of digits a person can remember and recall in the correct order.

Question 4

What is the secondary aim of the study?

Answer 4

To compare these findings to earlier research on adult, elderly and dementia participants to see if there were significant differences in digit span capacity across these different age groups.

Question 5

True or False: The study includes participants from both young and elderly age groups.

Answer 5

True.
This inclusion allows for a comprehensive analysis of phonological capacity across the lifespan.

Question 6

Fill in the blank: The study aims to investigate the phonological loop in children aged between 5-17 using _______ as a measure of phonological capacity.

Answer 6

digit span

Question 7

What is subvocalising and what age does it develop?

Answer 7

Repeating information over and over on your head.
It develops at age 7.

Question 8

How many volunteers were used?

Answer 8

570

Question 9

Where were the volunteers from and what language did they speak?

Answer 9

Madrid, Spain.
They spoke Native Spanish.

Question 10

What ages were the volunteers?

Answer 10

They were taken from pre, primary and secondary schools. Aged 5-17

Question 11

What did parents and children have to confirm about the volunteers? Were the participants allowed to repeat the study?

Answer 11

That there were no cognitive, hearing, reading or writing impairments.
Participants never repeated the study a second time.

Question 12

How many groups were the participants divided into and what ages were each group?

Answer 12

5 different groups of ages:
5
6-8
9-11
12-14
15-17

Question 13

What was the procedure of the experiment?

Answer 13

-Participants were tested individually and read increasing sequences of digits to recall in the correct order.
-Read at a rate of 1 per second and the digit list increased 1 digit per sequence.

Question 14

What did they do with the results at the end of the procedure?

Answer 14

Compared the results with the performance of other groups such as healthy elderly and Alzheimer’s disease patients.

Question 15

What are the mean digit span results of the study for each age group?

Answer 15

5 years= 3.76
6-8 years= 4.34
9-11 years= 5.13
12-14 years= 5.46
15-17 years= 5.83

Question 16

What do the results of the study show about ages?

Answer 16

It shows that the development of digit span is developmental (improves as we get older).

Question 17

How can the results be somehow affected by certain children?

Answer 17

-Some children have more difficulty reading than others.
-Dyslexia has a shorter capacity in PL so it cannot hold sounds to match the letters.
-People have different digit spans- therefore different abilities (individual differences).

Question 18

what are the 3 points Sebastian and Hernandez-Gil took from the results?

Answer 18

-Digit span develops with age. It is a developmental process that is supported at age 7 by the ability to sub-vocalise.
-The developmental course of digit span changes in old age when phonological loop capacity reduces to resemble that of older children- age related, not dementia related.
-Digit span varies with culture- Spanish children continued to increase digit span until 17, English until 15. Difference is due to word length effect.

Question 19

What are the 3 conclusions they took from the study?

Answer 19

-Digit down increases with age; this increased capacity appears to occur when children are able to subvocalise at around the age of 7.
-Digit span in the Spanish population is significantly shorter than Anglo-Saxon culture, probably due to the word length effect associated with digits.
-Poor digit span in old age is a developmental process due to ageing, not neurological disease, such as dementia.

Question 20

What is the strength and weakness of the generalisability of the study?

Answer 20

-Strength= Used a large sample size of 570 children with a variety of aged, from a variety of school (public and private). this means that results are easily generalised to the population as it represents the target population of children.
-Weakness= all children are from Madrid so generalisability is limited to city populations and Spanish Native speakers and therefore limits generalisability to other cultures and rural areas . Therefore is confounds the results.

Question 21

What is the strength of reliability?

Answer 21

Strength- It is a standardised procedure as the same digit tests were given to all participants and read at 1 per second. This means the study can be repeated to check for consistency as digit span increases with age.

Question 22

What are the 2 strengths of the study’s applicability?

Answer 22

-Strength 1= The results indicate that digit span is a developmental process which can be applied to learning to read. It tells us that children can only hold a certain amount of information in their working memory and that the phonological loop will be easily overloaded with too much information.
-Strength 2= Results demonstrate word length effect and the implications it has on memory developments as different cultures will develop their digit span at different speeds based on how long the words they have to remember are.

Question 23

What is the strength of the validity of the study?

Answer 23

-Strength= Internal validity- they controlled the variables well like screening the learning impairments of participants. The researchers were confident that the digit span increase was due to age and not impairments.

Question 24

What are the 2 weaknesses of the validity of the study?

Answer 24

-Weakness 1= Lacked control- the researchers said the participants didn’t “present” impairments. This meant the children were not directly tested and researchers relied on parents to divulge impairments. If any participants did, it could’ve influenced the procedure and seriously undermined the validity of the study.
-Weakness 2= Low Ecological Validity- tasks lacked mundane realism as it was recalling lists of digits. An artificial memory task doesn’t reflect everyday life and therefore we cannot apply the results to every day instances like memory recall.

Question 25

Was the study ethical? Is this a strength?

Answer 25

Yes, it is a strength.
Participants gave informed consent, had the right to withdraw, were fully debriefed, confidentially maintained, they were caused no harm and were not deceived in the study.

Question 26

What are the 3 strengths and weaknesses that can be linked together?

Answer 26

1- large sample size, ages, school can be linked to the fact they’re all from Madrid.
2- field experiment, well controlled, standardised can be linked to how it lacked control due to impairments.
3- applied to everyday life can be applied to its low ecological validity.