The Relative and Perceived Impact of Irrelevant Speech, Vocal Music and Non-vocal Music on Working Memory Thomas R. Alley & Marcie E. Greene Published online: 16 October 2008 # Springer Science + Business Media, LLC 2008 Abstract The ability to retain and manipulate information for brief periods of time is crucial for proficient cognitive functioning but working memory (WM) is susceptible to disruption by irrelevant speech. Music may also be detrimental, but its impact on WM is not clear. This study assessed the effects of vocal music, equivalent instrumental music, and irrelevant speech on WM in order to clarify what aspect of music affects performance and the degree of impairment. To study this, 60 college students completed WM tests (digit span) in the presence of irrelevant speech, vocal music, instrumental (karaoke) versions of the vocal music, and silence. As expected, both speech and vocal music degraded performance. WM performance with instrumental music was better than with vocal music but not significantly different from either silence or speech. Familiarity with song lyrics had little effect on performance. People were poor judges of the degree of memory impairment resulting from various irrelevant sounds. Keywords Working memory . Irrelevant sound . Interference The ability to retain and manipulate information for brief periods of time is crucial for proficient cognitive functioning. In recent years, most cognitive psychologists have conceptualized this ability as a reflection of a multi-component “working memory” (WM), and acknowledged that WM is vulnerable to interference from certain concurrent activities or sensory inputs. Exactly which activities or inputs can interfere with particular WM tasks, and why, remains a topic with considerable research activity and debate. The most commonly proposed and discussed components of WM are two independent subsystems, the “phonological loop” and the “visuospatial sketchpad”, Curr Psychol (2008) 27:277–289 DOI 10.1007/s12144-008-9040-z This study was reviewed and approved by the Clemson University Institutional Review Board. T. R. Alley (*) : M. E. Greene Department of Psychology, Clemson University, 418 Brackett Hall, Clemson, SC 29634-1355, USA e-mail: Alley@Clemson.edu