Working Memory

Working memory is a limited-capacity cognitive system responsible for temporarily holding and manipulating information in service of ongoing tasks. Baddeley and Hitch (1974) proposed an influential multi-component model comprising a phonological loop for verbal material, a visuospatial sketchpad for visual and spatial material, and a central executive that allocates attention across both. Working-memory capacity is a robust predictor of fluid intelligence, reading comprehension, and complex task performance.

Reference: Baddeley & Hitch, 1974. The NeuroRank implementation holds the canonical form and scales interference via task-irrelevant stimulus density.

1. Tracking enemy ability cooldowns across a five-versus-five teamfight in League of Legends while still executing your own combo.
2. Holding the utility counts of five opponents in CS2: how many smokes, flashes, and molotovs each has left, and which sites they can still execute onto.
3. Keeping a running mental tally of rotations, ring timings, and remaining squads in the last two rings of an Apex Legends match.

NeuroRank's Memory module uses a visuospatial grid-recall task, a direct measure of the sketchpad component of working memory. Sequence length escalates until the player fails, and partial-credit scoring captures near-misses. The module produces the Working Memory dimension score.