| Non-computerised WM intervention approach | Paper | Rationale provided for dosage | Dosage |
Do study authors reflect on dosage in their discussion? | |||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Dose | Dose frequency |
Total intervention duration | |||||
| Session duration (mins) | Session frequency (times per week) | ||||||
| Adapting environment | Elliott et al. (2010) | No | No details provided to quantify amount of teacher training provided. Specifying dosage for the children in this study is not applicable due to the nature of the intervention | 8–11 months | No | ||
| Direct WM without strategy training | Banales et al. (2015) | No | ? | 30 | 3 | 8 weeks | They question if the amount of training was sufficient but do not comment on the impact of the intervention being delivered via Skype |
| Henry et al. (2014) | Yes. Number of sessions chosen to conform to computerised training studies | 22 trials (11 of each task) | 10 | 3 | 6 weeks | Yes. They suggest the brevity of each session supported children’s compliance, enjoyment and motivation and contributed to effectiveness of the intervention | |
| Passolunghi and Costa (2016) | ? | 60 | 2 | 5 weeks | No | ||
| Direct WM training with strategy training | Caviola et al. (2009) | No | ? | 40 (plus 10 min discussion) | 2 | 4 weeks (7 sessions) | No |
| Comblain (1994) | Yes. Inspired by methodology in a previous study | ? | 30 | 1 | 8 weeks | No | |
| Cornoldi et al. (2015) | No | ? | 60 | 1 | 8 weeks | No | |
| Peng and Fuchs (2015) | No | ? | 35 | 1 per day | 10 consecutive days | Yes. They question if the amount of training was sufficient | |
| Witt (2011) | No | ? | 15 | ? | 6 weeks | No | |
| Training skills which may indirectly impact on WM: phonological awareness | Melby-Lervåg and Hulme (2010) | No | ? | 7 | 1 | 10 consecutive days (Mon- Fri for 2 school weeks) | No |
|
Van Kleeck et al. (2006) Dosage data extracted from intervention study (Van Kleeck et al. (1998) |
No. | ? | 15 | 2 | 12 weeks each of rhyme & phoneme awareness training (24 weeks total) | The authors suggest the brevity of the brevity of the intervention sessions make it attractive and replicable. No discussion on the effectiveness of the dosage provided | |
| Training skills that may indirectly impact on WM: physical activity | Alesi et al. (2016) | No | ? | 75 | 2 | 6 months | No |
| Davis et al. (2007) | Yes. Inspired by methodology in a previous study | ? | Low dose – 20 High dose – 40 |
5 | 15 | Yes. They suggest that the total intervention duration may have been too short and reported that the high dose condition was more effective | |
| Kamijo et al. (2011) | No | ? | 120 | 1 | 150 days (9 months) | No | |
| Koutsandréou et al. (2016) | No | ? | 45 | 3 | 10 weeks | No | |
| Van der Niet et al. (2016) | No | ? | 30 | 2 | 22 weeks | Yes. Authors suggest that lack of effect on physical fitness may be related to the frequency or intensity of the intervention | |
| Training skills that may indirectly impact on WM: play | Thibodeau et al. (2016) | Yes. Number of sessions chosen to conform to computerised training studies | ? | 15 | 5 | 5 weeks | No |
| Training skills that may indirectly impact on WM: inhibition | Volckaert and Noël (2015) | ? | 45 | 2 | 8 weeks | Yes. The authors reported moderate effect sizes and suggest that more than 16 sessions may be required to obtain larger effects | |
Note: Cumulative intervention intensity (dose × dose frequency × total intervention duration) was omitted from this table as it was only calculable for one study (Henry et al., 2014) which provided the number of trials per session (dose). Cumulative intensity for Henry et al. (2014) = 396 (22 × 3 × 6).