Abstract

The role of verbal and visuospatial information processing in Tower of London (TOL)
tasks was investigated. The first part of the investigation examined the verbal and
visuospatial abilities and preferred cognitive style (visualizer vs. verbalizer) of 79
participants, in an inter-individual differences approach. Visuospatial abilities significantly
predicted TOL performance, but the impact of cognitive style was negligible. The second
part applied a dual-task manipulation of concurrent interference of TOL planning tasks
on verbal and visuospatial memory, using the same participants. Concurrent processing
of the TOL tasks diminished visuospatial memory performance considerably but had
no effect on verbal memory, and there was no interaction between cognitive style
and memory. These findings clearly underscore the role of visuospatial information
processing in TOL tasks and indicate little bearing of verbal or visual cognitive style on
TOL problem solving. These results have important implications for TOL and cognitive
style in clinical application and cognitive neuroimaging research.