Abstract
This study examined whether mnemonic training had an effect on working memory capacity. Two types of visual imagery mnemonic training, including Method of Loci and Body Hook, were adopted. The experimental group who received the training was compared with the control group on six working memory tasks. Forty freshmen participated in this study. They were equally divided into the experiment and control groups. At first, all participants took the six working memory tasks, including two simple span tasks ( Digits Forward, Digits Backward ), two complex span tasks ( Operation Span, Reading Span ), and two visuo-spatial tasks ( Visuo-Spatial Simple Span, Spatial Span ). A week later, both the experiment and control groups took a two-hour training course. The experiment group received training on imagery mnemonic, while the control group received the thinking method training unrelated to mnemonic. A week after the training, all participants took the six working memory capacity tasks again. The result showed that the imagery mnemonic training increased the working memory capacity of reading span, visuo-spatial simple span and spatial span. These results indicated that working memory capacity could be changed by training. Imagery mnemonic made the storage of information more effective by using visual imagery and further increased the capacity of visual working memory.