Fitamen Christophe, Camos Valérie
Département de Psychologie, Université de Fribourg, Fribourg, Switzerland.
Laboratoire de Psychologie Cognitive, UMR 7290, Université d'Aix-Marseille and CNRS, Marseille, France.
Front Psychol. 2021 Apr 28;12:659020. doi: 10.3389/fpsyg.2021.659020. eCollection 2021.
It has been shown that acting in a game-like task improves preschoolers' working memory when tested in a reconstruction task. The game context and the motor activity during the game would provide goal cues bringing support to the memory processes. The aim of the present study was to test this hypothesis by examining preschoolers' working memory performance in a game-like task compared to an exercise-like task, which offers less goal cues. In the present study, 5-year-olds had to maintain a series of fruits and vegetables while acting in a game-like task or remaining static during the same task presented in a school-exercise context (within-subject factor). Memory performance was tested either through oral recall or reconstruction of the series of memory items (between-subject factor). Despite the fact that memory performance did not differ between the two conditions (game vs. exercise) whatever the type of memory tests, performance was worst in the game-like than in the exercise condition when the exercise was presented first. No difference emerged between conditions when the game condition was performed first. This result suggests that preschoolers were able to take advantage of acting in the game-like condition to integrate some task requirements, which were beneficial for performing the exercise condition.
研究表明，在类似游戏的任务中行动，在重构任务测试时能提高学龄前儿童的工作记忆。游戏情境以及游戏中的运动活动会提供目标线索，为记忆过程提供支持。本研究的目的是通过比较学龄前儿童在类似游戏的任务与类似练习的任务中的工作记忆表现来验证这一假设，后者提供的目标线索较少。在本研究中，5岁儿童在类似游戏的任务中行动时或在学校练习情境中呈现的相同任务中保持静止时（主体内因素），必须记住一系列水果和蔬菜。通过口头回忆或重构记忆项目系列来测试记忆表现（主体间因素）。尽管无论记忆测试类型如何，两种条件（游戏与练习）下的记忆表现没有差异，但当首先呈现练习时，类似游戏条件下的表现比练习条件下的表现更差。当首先进行游戏条件时，两种条件之间没有差异。这一结果表明，学龄前儿童能够利用在类似游戏的条件下行动来整合一些任务要求，这对执行练习条件是有益的。
