Code for: No clear support for differential influences of visuospatial and phonological resources on mental arithmetic: A Registered Report

Contains supplementary materials (arithmetic tasks, additional analyses, and documentation of deviations from original pre-registration) for: Chen, E. H., Bailey, D. H., & Jaeggi, S. M. (2022). No Clear Support for Differential Influences of Visuospatial and Phonological Resources on Mental Arithmetic: A Registered Report. Journal of Numerical Cognition, 8(2), 259-280. https://doi.org/10.5964/jnc.8421

Contains Dataset and Codebook for: Chen, E. H., Bailey, D. H., & Jaeggi, S. M. (2022). No Clear Support for Differential Influences of Visuospatial and Phonological Resources on Mental Arithmetic: A Registered Report. Journal of Numerical Cognition, 8(2), 259-280. https://doi.org/10.5964/jnc.8421

Protocol for dual-task experiment for: Chen, E. H., Bailey, D. H., & Jaeggi, S. M. (2022). No Clear Support for Differential Influences of Visuospatial and Phonological Resources on Mental Arithmetic: A Registered Report. Journal of Numerical Cognition, 8(2), 259-280. https://doi.org/10.5964/jnc.8421

Separate but related cognitive processes are hypothesized to influence different arithmetic operations. Working memory has been compartmentalized into a number of different sub-processes, such as phonological memory and visuospatial memory that are believed to have unique contributions to the performance of two distinct arithmetic operations: multiplication and subtraction. Influential work had initially produced these effects, but subsequent experiments have yielded inconsistent results. Because the reasons for these inconsistencies are not immediately apparent, the current study aims to systematically review these subsequent attempts and propose an experimental design to investigate a differential effect between working memory processes and arithmetic operation. This report will attempt to replicate this effect using tasks developed from prior work and perform analyses across a number of different subsamples. Details for predictions, methods, and analytic plans are described further below.

Several working memory processes have been hypothesized to influence different arithmetic operations. Working memory has been compartmentalized into a number of different sub-processes, such as phonological memory and visuospatial memory that are believed to have unique contributions to the performance of two distinct arithmetic operations: multiplication and subtraction. A previous dual task experiment produced these effects, but subsequent experiments have yielded inconsistent results. Because the reasons for these inconsistencies are not immediately apparent, the current study systematically reviewed these subsequent attempts and attempted to replicate this effect in a within-subjects dual task experiment using tasks developed from prior work across a number of different subsamples. In contrast to the original finding, we observed no differential impact of specific working memory secondary tasks by arithmetic operation in any of our analyses. However, our analyses do not entirely rule out the possibility of differential effects of working memory tasks. Our findings suggest that the working memory facet by arithmetic operation interactions observed in previous work may be idiosyncratic in nature and difficult to predict a priori in subsequent experiments.