Heled Eyal
Department of Psychology, Ariel University, Ariel, Israel.
Department of Neurological Rehabilitation, Sheba Medical Center, Ramat-Gan, Israel.
J Neuropsychol. 2025 Mar;19(1):67-80. doi: 10.1111/jnp.12385. Epub 2024 Sep 2.
The Tactual Span assesses tactile working memory (WM) using both hands while applying forward and backward conditions. The study objectives were to validate a one-hand version of the Tactual Span and to evaluate WM laterality in the tactile modality. Of the 145 participants, 80 performed the Tactual Span with their right hand, and 65 performed it with their left hand. Moreover, all participants performed two span tasks in the visuo-spatial and auditory modalities, each encompassing forward and backward conditions. Results revealed adequate Cronbach's alpha values for each hand in both conditions of the Tactual Span, along with a positive correlation between forward and backward conditions in each hand. However, overall performance on the Tactual Span was poorer compared to performance on the Auditory and Visuo-spatial Spans. Furthermore, in the forward condition, there was a correlation between the Auditory Span and the Tactual Span, but only for the right hand. In the backward condition, the Auditory Span correlated with the Tactual Span in both hands. The findings indicate that there is no effect of hand laterality in tactile WM, showing the two hands are related to each other in their WM function. Additionally, the one-hand version of the Tactual Span is deemed useful for evaluating tactile WM and can therefore be used in empirical and clinical settings for neuropsychological assessment purposes.
触觉广度测试在双手执行向前和向后条件时评估触觉工作记忆（WM）。研究目的是验证触觉广度测试的单手版本，并评估触觉模式下的工作记忆偏侧性。在145名参与者中，80人用右手进行触觉广度测试，65人用左手进行。此外，所有参与者在视觉空间和听觉模式下执行两个广度任务，每个任务都包括向前和向后条件。结果显示，在触觉广度测试的两种条件下，每只手的克朗巴哈系数值都足够，并且每只手的向前和向后条件之间存在正相关。然而，与听觉和视觉空间广度测试的表现相比，触觉广度测试的总体表现较差。此外，在向前条件下，听觉广度测试与触觉广度测试之间存在相关性，但仅针对右手。在向后条件下，听觉广度测试与双手的触觉广度测试都相关。研究结果表明，触觉工作记忆中不存在手偏侧性的影响，表明两只手在其工作记忆功能中相互关联。此外，触觉广度测试的单手版本被认为对评估触觉工作记忆有用，因此可用于神经心理学评估目的的实证和临床环境中。
