Working Memory - History

History

The term "working memory" was coined by Miller, Galanter, and Pribram, and was used in the 1960s in the context of theories that likened the mind to a computer. Atkinson and Shiffrin (1968) also used this term, "working memory" (p. 92) to describe their "short-term store." What we now call working memory was referred to as a "short-term store" or short-term memory, primary memory, immediate memory, operant memory, or provisional memory. Short-term memory is the ability to remember information over a brief period of time (in the order of seconds). Most theorists today use the concept of working memory to replace or include the older concept of short-term memory, thereby marking a stronger emphasis on the notion of manipulation of information instead of passive maintenance.

The earliest mention of experiments on the neural basis of working memory can be traced back to over 100 years ago, when Hitzig and Ferrier described ablation experiments of the prefrontal cortex (PFC), they concluded that the frontal cortex was important for cognitive rather than sensory processes. In 1935 and 1936, Carlyle Jacobsen and colleagues were the first to show the deleterious effect of prefrontal ablation on delayed response.