How Much Can You Improve Working Memory?
As anyone who reads this blog will know by now, you can change your brain and you can improve your working memory and this begs the question, “By how much?” In an interview conducted for Science Magazine last February, Dr. Torkel Klingberg of the Karolinska Institutet in Stockholm commented on a study he had conducted that demonstrated that working memory training actually changes the structure of the brain, Dr. Klingberg said that the training was associated with changes in the brain’s dopamine system.
I jumped to what I thought was the logical conclusion, when I first heard about the study–that the training increased the number of dopamine receptors (actually D1 receptors) and that this meant there might not be any limit on how great that improvement might be. Like most things involving the brain, it is not that simple. Dr. Klingberg made it clear in the interview that the training changed the density of D1 receptors. He went on to say that either too much or too little is not good and that for most subjects in the study, there was actually a decrease in receptor density and that for some of them there was a very small increase.
From my own experience I know that stimulants such as Ritalin (or its many varients such as Concerta or Biphentin) increase the amount of the neurotransmitter dopamine available to the brain. But it would seem that there is something much more complicated and refined going on with working memory training.
Why is this important? In the interview Dr. Klingberg points out that working memory deficits occur in ADHD, but also in schizophrenia and even the normal aging process. So improving working memory may have a beneficial effect on some of these disorders. Finding the optimal dose of a medication is a tricky issue, especially with stimulants. But it would appear from what Dr. Torkel says that working memory training is self regulating, that, put quite simply, you can’t over do it. It would seem that working memory training is a safe, effective and efficient way of improving working memory and, hopefully having an effect on disorders where deficits in working memory is a factor.
Beyond all this, another study conducted at the Karolinska Institutet, constructed a mathematical model of the brain and using this model discovered a mechanism that restricts the number of items held in working memory to seven.