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The Effect of Self-Reported

Stress on Working

Memory

Olivia How, Navi Kanakamedala, Aliana Wilson Mejia

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Introduction

  • How does self-reported stress correlate with performance on a memory test?
  • Stress: The body’s physiological or psychological response to stressors, internal or external (American Psychological Association, 2020).
  • Research Hypothesis: Stress is negatively related to memory performance.

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Importance and Implications

  • As college students, we face a lot of stress and stressors but we are expected to use our memory to the best of its abilities for education
  • Understanding the relationship between stress and memory can help us understand how to improve our working memory

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Prior Research

  • Relationship between working memory, and stress and anxiety (Lukasik et al., 2019)
    • Non-depressed adults
    • Questionnaires that assessed stress, anxiety, and ten working

memory tests

      • Administered online
      • Short Form Perceived Stress Scale (PSS-4)
      • Six-Item Form of the Spielberger State-Trait Anxiety Inventory

(STAI-6)

      • Working memory test battery
    • Procedure: Background questionnaire, then ten working

memory tests

      • Control for order effects: questionnaires random except for one pair of tests
    • No relationship between stress and working memory

performance

      • Why?

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Prior Research (ctd.)

  • Acute stress, memory, attention and cortisol (K. Vedhara et al, 2000)
    • Natural stressor = exams
    • Stress measured via PSS and saliva
    • Memory tasks = list of 20 words & 3 TEA tasks

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Methods

  • Posted on SONA, PSYC 1200
  • Psytoolkit
  • Perceived Stress Scale

Questionnaire

    • Created by: Cohen, Kamarck and

Mermelstein

  • Memory Task 1: Word Recall
  • Memory Task 2: Shape

Recognition

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Memory Recall: Shapes

Original Shapes

Test Shapes

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Memory Recall: Words

List #1

  • Password
  • Stem
  • Bait
  • Detective
  • Pop
  • Budget
  • Overlook

List #2

  • Level
  • Perfume
  • Crossing
  • Situation
  • Pat
  • Beat
  • Trust

List #3

  • Oven
  • Witch
  • Hardware
  • Advance
  • Owl
  • Strap
  • Cheat

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Preprocessing of Data

individual responses to PSS

txt files showing individual responses to memory recall tasks

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Preprocessing of Data (ctd.)

name given

to shapes

1 = “yes”

2 = “no”

words the

subject typed in

words from

each list in the

order they were

shown

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Python code used to preprocess data

Preprocessing of Data (ctd.)

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Results

  • Summary Statistics
  • Two linear regressions
  • Correlation tests
  • Power analysis

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Summary Stats

  • PSS Score
    • Average = 21.11
    • SD = 7.737524
  • Shape Recall
    • Average = 5.111
    • SD = 1.778595
  • Word Recall
    • Average = 13.39
    • SD = 5.862532

​

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Summary Stats

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Linear Regressions and Models

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Correlation

r ~ 0.06

r ~ -0.12

​

r ~ -0.34

​

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Power Test

  • Determine what sample size would produce the best effect size
  • r value comes from correlation coefficients
  • Largest for future experiment

​

Stress vs Words

Stress vs Shape

Words vs Shape

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Discussion

  • Future studies
    • Larger sample size for better effect size, generalization of results
    • Seeing the pattern between word versus shape recall
      • Some people might be better visually remembering while others will be better with words and letters

.

  • Conclusions
    • Not enough data to come to a significant result

�

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References

  • American Psychological Association. (2020). APA Dictionary of

Psychology. American Psychological Association. Retrieved October

10, 2021, from https://dictionary.apa.org/stress

  • Cohen, S. (n.d.). Penn College - perceived stress scale - SPRC. Perceived Stress Scale. Retrieved October 13,

2021, from https://www.sprc.org/system/files/private/event-training/Penn%20Col

lege%20-%20Perceived%20Stress%20Scale.pdf

  • Lukasik, K. M., Waris, O., Soveri, A., Lehtonen, M., & Laine, M. (2019, January 23). The relationship of anxiety

and stress with working memory performance in a large non-depressed sample. Frontiers in

Psychology. Retrieved October 13, 2021, from

https://www.frontiersin.org/articles/10.3389/fpsyg.2019.00004/full#h3

  • Stoet, G. (2010). PsyToolkit - A software package for programming psychological experiments using Linux.

Behavior Research Methods, 42(4), 1096-1104.

  • Stoet, G. (2017). PsyToolkit: A novel web-based method for running online questionnaires and reaction-time

experiments. Teaching of Psychology, 44(1), 24-31.

  • Vedhara, K., Hyde, J., Gilchrist, I. D., Tytherleigh, M., & Plummer, S. (2000). Acute stress, memory, attention

and cortisol. Psychoneuroendocrinology, 25(6), 535–549. https://doi.org/10.1016/s0306-4530(00)00008-1

  • https://www.mindgarden.com/documents/PerceivedStressScale.pdf

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Questions?