Which manipulation selectively disrupts rehearsal of verbal information in experiments?

• A. Spatial navigation tasks are unaffected.
• B. Articulatory suppression selectively disrupts rehearsal of verbal information.
• C. Visual masking disrupts rehearsal.
• D. Tactile tapping improves rehearsal.

Answer: (B)

Verbal rehearsal happens in the phonological loop, with an inner speech process that refreshes verbal items. When you introduce articulatory suppression—having someone repeatedly say a meaningless syllable while trying to remember words—the inner voice is occupied and can’t refresh the verbal items. This directly interferes with the rehearsal mechanism for verbal information, leading to poorer recall. Other manipulations don’t target this rehearsal process specifically: tasks like spatial navigation tap into the visuospatial sketchpad, visual masking affects visual encoding, and tactile tapping doesn’t selectively improve verbal rehearsal. So, articulatory suppression best explains the selective disruption of rehearsing verbal material.