The Effects of Working Memory Training on Brain Activity
Open accessAbstract
This study aimed to investigate if two weeks of working memory (WM) training on a progressive N-back task can generate changes in the activity of the underlying WM neural network. Forty-six healthy volunteers (23 training and 23 controls) were asked to perform the N-back task during three fMRI scanning sessions: (1) before training, (2) after the half of training sessions, and (3) at the end. Between the scanning sessions, the experimental group underwent a 10-session training of working memory with the use of an adaptive version of the N-back task, while the control group did not train anything. The N-back task in the scanning sessions was relatively easy (n = 2) in order to ensure high accuracy and a lack of between-group differences at the behavioral level. Such training-induced differences in neural efficiency were expected. Behavioral analyses revealed improved performance of both groups on the N-back task. However, these improvements resulted from the test-retest effect, not the training outside scanner. Performance on the non-trained stop-signal task did not demonstrate any transfer effect. Imaging analysis showed changes in activation in several significant clusters, with overlapping regions of interest in the frontal and parietal lobes. However, patterns of between-session changes of activation did not show any effect of training. The only finding that can be linked with training consists in strengthening the correlation between task performance accuracy and activation of the parietal regions of the neural network subserving working memory (left superior parietal lobule and right supramarginal gyrus posterior). These results suggest that the effects of WM training consist in learning that, in order to ensure high accuracy in the criterion task, activation of the parietal regions implicated in working memory updating must rise.
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Decreased activation in L-AG and R-IPL may reflect changes in task representations and reduced reliance on parietal engagement.
“Decreased activation in the L–AG and R–IPL—parietal regions implicated in information maintenance and manipulation—may reflect changes in task representations and reduced reliance on parietal engagement56,67, consistent with their correlated changes and prior evidence for coupling between default-mode and frontoparietal control systems.”
From Meta-analysis of computerised working memory training: behavioural gains, training parameters, transfer mechanisms, and neural correlates (2026) · cites this paper as [56]
The Discussion (page unavailable) reports decreased parietal activation in participants with lower task accuracy, but identifies the regions as the left superior parietal lobule and right posterior supramarginal gyrus, not the L–AG and R–IPL. It does not interpret the decrease as a change in task representations or reduced reliance on parietal engagement; instead, it reports greater activation with better accuracy and says it found no support for a general neural-efficiency explanation. (LLM, conf=0.84)
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Neural correlates of working memory training: An fMRI meta-analysis
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“…IPL — parietal regions implicated ininformationmaintenanceandmanipulation — mayre fl ectchangesintask representations and reduced reliance on parietal engagement 56,67 , consistent with their correlated changes and prior evidence for coupling between default-mode and frontoparietal control systems.”
- Authors
- Nęcka, E., Gruszka, A., Hampshire, A., Sarzyńska-Wawer, J., Anicai, A.-E., Orzechowski, J., Nowak, M., Wójcik, N., Sandrone, S., & Soreq, E.
- Affiliations
- Faculty of Philosophy, Institute of Psychology, Jagiellonian University in Kraków, 31-007 Krakow, Poland
- Jagiellonian University (PL)
- Imperial College London (GB)
- Institute of Psychology, Polish Academy of Sciences, 00-090 Warsaw, Poland
- Uniwersytet SWPS (PL)
- ORCID
- Venue
- Brain Sciences
- Publisher
- MDPI AG
- Published
- 2021-01-25
- Volume
- 11
- Issue
- 2
- Pages
- 155
- ISSN
- 2076-3425 (ISSN-L)
- PMC
- PMC7911688
- OpenAlex
- W3121871355
- Cited by
- 23
- References
- 71
- Citations by year
- 2026: 6 · 2025: 4 · 2024: 4 · 2023: 6 · 2022: 2 · 2021: 1
- FWCI
- 3.14
- Type
- journal article
- Language
- en
- Open access
- gold
- doi.org
- Licence
- Locations
- Brain Sciences (publishedVersion, cc-by)
- PubMed Central (publishedVersion, cc-by)
- PubMed (publishedVersion)
- Homo Politicus (Academy of Humanities and Economics in Lodz) (submittedVersion, cc-by)
- DOAJ (DOAJ: Directory of Open Access Journals) (submittedVersion, cc-by-sa)
- Funders
- Narodowe Centrum Nauki (National Science Center), Poland (DEC-2013/08/A/HS6/00045)
- Topics
- Social Sciences › Psychology › Experimental and Cognitive Psychology › Cognitive Abilities and Testing
- Life Sciences › Neuroscience › Cognitive Neuroscience › Neural and Behavioral Psychology Studies
- Social Sciences › Psychology › Experimental and Cognitive Psychology › Cognitive Functions and Memory
- Keywords
- working memory training, n-back task, neural efficiency, brain activity changes, parietal cortex, superior parietal lobule, supramarginal gyrus, frontal lobe, stop-signal task, transfer effects, test-retest effects, working memory updating
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