Working memory has been comprehensively studied in sensory domains, like vision, but little attention has been paid to how motor information (e.g., kinematics of recent movements) is maintained and manipulated in working memory. “Motor working memory” (MWM) is important for short-term behavioral control and skill learning. Here, we employed tasks that required participants to encode and recall reaching movements over short timescales. We conducted three experiments ( N = 65 undergraduates) to examine MWM under varying cognitive loads, delays, and degrees of interference. The results support a model of MWM that includes an abstract code that flexibly transfers across effectors, and an effector-specific code vulnerable to interfering movements, even when interfering movements are irrelevant to the task. Neither code was disrupted by increasing visuospatial working memory load. These results echo distinctions between representational formats in other domains, suggesting that MWM shares a basic computational structure with other working memory subsystems.

中文翻译：

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运动工作记忆中的可分离代码

工作记忆已经在视觉等感觉领域得到了全面的研究，但很少有人关注运动信息（例如最近运动的运动学）如何在工作记忆中维持和操纵。“运动工作记忆”（MWM）对于短期行为控制和技能学习很重要。在这里，我们采用的任务要求参与者在短时间内编码和回忆到达的动作。我们进行了三项实验（N = 65 名本科生）来检查不同认知负荷、延迟和干扰程度下的 MWM。结果支持 MWM 模型，该模型包括在效应器之间灵活传输的抽象代码，以及易受干扰运动影响的效应器特定代码，即使干扰运动与任务无关。这两个代码都没有因视觉空间工作记忆负载的增加而中断。这些结果呼应了其他领域的表征格式之间的区别，表明 MWM 与其他工作记忆子系统共享基本计算结构。