Digit Span Instructions A popular working memory test that is used in many cognitive and neuroscience research labs. The ability of working memory to perform such an action is a key part of an School University of California, San Diego Course Title PSYC 144 Type. Note: (⊗), (Ø), and (⊕) represent different tokens. The cognitive psychologist George Miller (1956) referred to “seven plus or minus two” pieces of information as the magic number in short-term memory. Despite their popularity, however, there has never been a comprehensive analysis of the merits of WM span tasks as measurement tools. For the Forward task, the individual repeats numbers spoken by the examiner. Participants see or hear a sequence of numerical digits and are tasked to recall the sequence correctly, with increasingly longer sequences being tested in each trial. A version of this task, the digit span task, is a component of many present-day memory assessment batteries such as the Wechsler scale (described below). Remember the letters in the order they appear on the screen. Visuo-spatial working memory span: a sensitive measure of cognitive deficits in children with ADHD. Experiment 1 employed traditionally used measures of WM capacity, specifically the Backward Digit Span task and the Operation Span (OSPAN) task. The easy operation span task accounted for 33% of the variance in VSAT, the original operation … The classical backward digit span task detects changes in working memory but is unsuitable for classifying the severity of dementia Appl Neuropsychol Adult.