What neurological evidence supports the WMM, particularly the Central Executive?

• A. Neuroimaging shows prefrontal-parietal networks; neuropsychological findings (e.g., KF) support separable subsystems with distinct neural correlates.
• B. Only the hippocampus is involved.
• C. There is no neurological evidence for WM structure.
• D. The occipital cortex is the sole mediator.

Answer: (A)

Neurological evidence for the Working Memory Model, and especially for the Central Executive, comes from how the brain handles attention control and manipulation of information. When tasks require actively controlling, updating, inhibiting, or switching what we hold in working memory, imaging studies repeatedly show activity in a frontoparietal network centered in the prefrontal cortex. That pattern fits a domain-general control system—the Central Executive—that coordinates the separate memory buffers.

Neuropsychological findings reinforce this. Patients like KF show a double dissociation: impaired auditory-verbal short-term memory with relatively intact visuospatial memory, indicating distinct neural substrates for different memory subsystems and supportive evidence that a central control mechanism manages them rather than a single store in one brain region. This combination of frontal-network activation during executive-demand tasks and dissociations across memory types aligns well with the idea of a Central Executive coordinating subsystems with separate neural bases.

This also clarifies why broader or more limited claims don’t fit. The hippocampus isn’t the sole player in working memory, since WM involves short-term control across modalities, not just long-term memory formation. The occipital cortex isn’t sufficient to explain the central control and cross-domain coordination WM tasks require.