Table 7.
Observed and simulated means (standard deviations between brackets) for the secondary task RTs, total processing time, and memory span in the complex span task design with memory list lengths from 1 to 7 and with tasks varying in difficulty (parity vs. location judgment) executed during the maintenance and retention periods.
| NUMBER OF STIMULI | PARITY | LOCATION | ||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| RT | TOTAL TIME | SPAN | RT | TOTAL TIME | SPAN | |
| Observed | ||||||
| 4 | 628 (117) | 2,467 (400) | 5.16 (0.78) | 484 (61) | 1,928 (233) | 5.56 (0.75) |
| 6 | 551 (53) | 3,251 (316) | 4.58 (1.23) | 387 (41) | 2,297 (239) | 5.52 (0.62) |
| 8 | 483 (32) | 3,724 (218) | 3.69 (0.63) | 361 (39) | 2,827 (266) | 4.60 (0.82) |
| Simulated | ||||||
| 4 | 677 (46) | 2,707 (185) | 4.38 (0.69) | 607 (23) | 2,427 (93) | 4.94 (0.55) |
| 6 | 715 (49) | 4,290 (294) | 4.19 (0.81) | 624 (45) | 3,744 (270) | 4.56 (0.61) |
| 8 | 667 (27) | 5,334 (215) | 4.13 (0.60) | 606 (31) | 4,850 (247) | 4.44 (0.61) |