What is a common method to assess the capacity of the phonological store?

• A. Abstract reasoning tasks.
• B. Verbal short-term memory tasks with articulatory suppression and phonological similarity manipulations.
• C. Long-term memory recall.
• D. Visual-spatial span tasks.

Answer: (B)

Measuring the capacity of the phonological store is best done with verbal short-term memory tasks that use articulatory suppression and phonological similarity manipulations. Articulatory suppression prevents subvocal rehearsal, so performance reflects how much phonological information can be held in the store itself rather than being refreshed by rehearsal. Then, manipulating phonological similarity shows how items that sound alike interfere more, revealing that the store encodes and maintains information in a phonological form. Together, these manipulations isolate the phonological store’s capacity. Other task types—abstract reasoning, long-term memory recall, or visual-spatial span—tap different systems (general reasoning, long-term retrieval, or visuospatial sketchpad) and don’t specifically measure the phonological store.