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Updated: Aug 15, 2026

Assessing Working Memory in Children: The Comprehensive Assessment Battery for Children – Working Memory (CABC-WM)
Published on: June 12, 2017
What limits children's working memory span? Theoretical accounts and applications for scholastic development
G J Hitch1, J N Towse, U Hutton
1Department of Psychology, University of York, York YO10 5DD, United Kingdom. Department of Psychology, Lancaster University, Lancaster LA1 4YF, United Kingdom. g.hitch@psych.york.ac.uk
Abstract:
Explanations of working memory span in children were studied in a longitudinal follow-up of J. N. Towse, G. J. Hitch, and U. Hutton (1998). Reading span and operation span were lower when within-task retention intervals were lengthened. For each task, variation in span between test waves and age cohorts was systematically related to changes in processing speed. The two spans explained substantial shared variance in both reading and arithmetic scores, with some evidence for domain specificity. Combined span scores predicted unique variance in scholastic attainment over a 1-year interval. The authors concluded that working memory span is constrained by rapid loss of active codes and is not simply a measure of capacity for resource sharing. Working memory is also implicated in scholastic development.
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