What Is Left Unsaid About Semantic, Episodic and Working Memory: L2 Cognitive Control Accounts for Individual Differences and Gender Differences

Abstract

Background: Prefrontal cortex (PFC) is believed to manipulate cognitive control and mnemonic process to overcome interference. The interaction among memory, cognitive control, and language learning is still under debate. Objectives: This study investigated how episodic, semantic, and working memory (WM) as linguistically dependent retrieval cues can entail the interference process among EFL (English as a foreign language ) individuals. Methods: Combining the samples from five testing sectors in Shiraz, Iran, yielded data from 78 adult participants (33 males; 52 EFL independent users; 26 basic users; mean age 34.63). The participants took the test package of selection mechanism measures in resolving interference (SMMRI), including selection in semantic/episodic memory and WM/priming (backward printed reading comprehension). Both descriptive statistics (mean scores, standard deviations) and inferential statistics (Correlations, t-tests, interface resolution (IR)) were performed using SPSS software version 25.0. Results: There was a downward trend in the order of magnitude from episodic (OLD-NEW) toward semantic (high-selection) toward WM/priming. Also, there was a moderate/high correlation among the aforementioned memories. There was a significant difference in IR-scores between basic and independent users. Conclusions: Hierarchical process of compromises between L2 (Second language) memories indicated that the interactions of different cognitive sub-components played a central executive role. The difference between IR-scores revealed that training on WM tasks, which demanded higher activations in the PFC, could enhance the ability in resolving interference. Retrieval cues have limited concomitant memory capacity that integrate morphological, semantic, and syntactic features. However, men outperformed females in semantic selection, no significant gender difference was seen in episodic selection.