Spatial and Verbal Codes and the Capacity of STM †

Subjects were required to report an array of consonants presented tachistoscopically for various durations. Concurrently, they held in memory a load of auditory digits, a load of spatial locations or no load. These several forms of information did not seem to compete for a fixed capacity short term store. Consonant report was unaffected by carrying a spatial load and barely affected by carrying the auditory digit load. An auditory-verbal loop cannot play a mandatory role in the coding and storage of visual information. Some criticisms of structural interpretations of immediate memory are suggested.

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