Concomitant with the growing research interest in WM in general cognitive psychology, a number of streams of research have investigated the specific relationship between WM and the learning and processing of a first language (L1). This should come as no surprise, given that language is arguably one of the most complex and intriguing elements of higher-level human cognition (Andrade, 2014; Gathercole, 2007; Jackendoff, 2007a, 2012; Van Dyke, 2012). These strands of WM-language research have gradually developed into two rather well defined research paradigms that are respectively influenced by the two distinctive theoretical research camps of WM – the European tradition versus the North American tradition as discussed in Chapter 2 (Andrade, 2001, 2014). As the discussion has unfolded, it has become clear that the European camp has mostly focused on the role of phonological WM in vocabulary acquisition and development, whereas the North American camp has explored the implications of the executive elements of WM for language processing, in particular, reading comprehension.

In light of this broad distinction, in this chapter I provide a selective review of these well established strands of European and North American WM–L1 research, while excluding numerous other studies that have been conducted by scholars elsewhere. More specifically, the first section summarizes the WM and L1 research conducted by the European strand that focuses on the role of PWM in vocabulary acquisition and grammar development. The second and third sections examine studies on the relationship between EWM and L1 comprehension and production conducted by North American-based WM researchers. The following section discusses how the concept of WM has been incorporated into the theoretical frameworks of some of the general linguistic theories and sentence processing models. The fifth section summarizes these strands of WM–L1 research and concludes the chapter.

WM in L1 Acquisition and Vocabulary Development

The European tradition of WM–language research was largely spear-headed by the pioneering empirical work conducted by the British cognitive and developmental psychologists Alan Baddeley and Susan Gathercole at the Cambridge University MRC Applied Psychology Unit.