Vivion Maëliss, Guida Alessandro, Ramanoël Stephen, Mathy Fabien
BCL, CNRS, Université Côte d'Azur, Nice, France.
LP3C, Université de Rennes 2, Rennes, France.
Mem Cognit. 2025 Mar 21. doi: 10.3758/s13421-025-01702-3.
The SPoARC (spatial-positional association of response codes) effect refers to a mental spatialization of ordinal information in working memory. In the present study, we investigated how spatialization can be modulated by the number of items to be maintained in working memory. In Experiment 1, 139 participants performed a spatialization task with sequences of either two, three, four, or five items using a between-subjects design. The results showed a significant spatialization effect for all sequence lengths except for sequences of five items. In Experiment 2, 96 participants performed the same spatialization task for sequences of three, four, and five items, but using a within-subject design. The results confirmed the absence of a SPoARC effect for sequences of five items, and showed a greater effect for sequences of four items. Overall, our findings suggest that working memory load is a moderator of the spatialization effect. In addition, we found that spatialization was in part modulated by participants' spatial abilities.
反应代码的空间位置关联（SPoARC）效应指的是工作记忆中顺序信息的心理空间化。在本研究中，我们调查了工作记忆中要保持的项目数量如何调节空间化。在实验1中，139名参与者采用组间设计，对包含两个、三个、四个或五个项目的序列执行空间化任务。结果显示，除了五个项目的序列外，所有序列长度都有显著的空间化效应。在实验2中，96名参与者采用组内设计，对三个、四个和五个项目的序列执行相同的空间化任务。结果证实了五个项目的序列不存在SPoARC效应，并且四个项目的序列效应更大。总体而言，我们的研究结果表明工作记忆负荷是空间化效应的调节因素。此外，我们发现空间化部分受参与者空间能力的调节。
