Theorizing and measuring working memory in first and second language research

Working memory (WM) generally refers to the human ability to temporarily maintain and manipulate a limited amount of information in immediate consciousness when carrying out complex cognitive tasks such as problem-solving and language comprehension. Though much controversy has surrounded the WM concept since its inception by Baddeley & Hitch (1974), an increasing number of cognitive psychologists have accepted WM as a multi-component system comprising both domain-specific storage mechanisms and domain-general executive functions (Miyake & Shah 1999; Baddeley 2012; Williams 2012). Such a fractionated view of this cognitive construct manifests itself clearly in distinct strands of WM-language research, where two contrasting research paradigms have emerged (Wen 2012).