npj Science of Learning

AbstractResearch has implicated spatial ability as a robust predictor of aptitude, interest, and choice in STEM education and career pursuits. We address three under-explored questions regarding the role of spatial ability in STEM. First, can spatial ability consistently predict STEM success beyond other cognitive skills? Second, what aspects of spatial ability, if any, can predict success in STEM more accurately? Third, to what extent can genetic and environmental factors account for these predictions? We addressed these questions by leveraging data from the Twins Early Development Study (N = 3,936; age range = 16-22) and using 16 tests that assessed three domains of spatial ability: navigation, object manipulation, and visualization. Results show that all three domains are highly predictive of STEM educational outcomes, especially STEM degree choice. These associations persisted after accounting for verbal and general cognitive abilities (g), albeit attenuated. Associations were strongest for tests of object manipulation (e.g., 2D and 3D drawing, pattern assembly and mental rotation). Genetic factors accounted for most of the observed associations between spatial ability and STEM outcomes (62% - 86%) --genetic variance was mostly shared with g ([~] 40%) and, to a lesser extent, verbal ability ([~] 25%). Our findings highlight the potential utility of spatial ability as a specific predictor of success in STEM education and career choice beyond other cognitive abilities. Screening for and training spatial skills is likely useful for identifying potential, fostering talent, and improving outcomes in STEM. Significance StatementLeveraging a comprehensive battery of 16 spatial ability tests across multiple domains, we show that spatial ability has specific utility for predicting success in STEM education. Spatial skills predict success in STEM above and beyond other cognitive abilities, particularly when it comes to STEM engagement and pursuing further STEM education. Thus, spatial skills may be a fruitful target for policymakers, stakeholders, and industries looking to develop interventions, identify and foster talent, and reduce outcome disparities.

Many learning opportunities of mathematical reasoning in school encourage imitative learning procedures (algorithmic reasoning, AR) instead of engaging in more constructive reasoning processes (e.g., creative mathematical reasoning, CMR). Here, we employed a within-subject intervention in the classroom with pupils in upper secondary schools followed by a test situation during brain imaging with fMRI one week later. We hypothesized that learning with CMR compared to AR should lead to a CMR-effect, characterized by better performance and differential brain activity during test. We observed higher brain activity in key regions for mathematical cognition such as left angular gyrus and left inferior frontal gyrus on tasks previously learnt with CMR compared to AR. The effects remained when controlling for individual differences in cognitive abilities, as well as performance and response time differences between the two conditions. Encouraging pupils to engage in constructive processes when learning mathematical reasoning might thus have lasting beneficial effects.

Study questionAre there differences in operant learning and memory between mice born through intracytoplasmic sperm injection (ICSI) and naturally-conceived control (CTL) mice? Summary answerICSI females exhibited deficits in acquisition learning relative to CTL females, whereas ICSI males exhibited deficiency in discrimination learning and memory relative to CTL males during initial assessments. ICSI and CTL groups exhibited equally poor long-term retention of learned discrimination and memory performances at old age. What is known alreadySome human outcome studies have suggested that ICSI might be associated with an increased risk of certain cognitive disorders, but only one of two behavioral studies with ICSI mouse models have reported differences between ICSI and CTL females. No studies to date have investigated associative learning in ICSI mice. Study design, size, duration36 ICSI mice (18 male, 18 female) and 37 CTL mice (19 male, 18 female) aged 3-6 months were compared in a series of operant learning procedures that assessed acquisition of a new behavior, discrimination learning, and memory. 16 ICSI mice (9 male, 7 female) and 17 CTL mice (10 males, 7 females) received follow-up discrimination learning and memory assessments at 12 months of age (six months after the end of initial training) to evaluate retention and reacquisition of learned performances. Participants/materials, setting, methodsMice received daily operant learning sessions in experimental chambers in which all stimulus events and the recording of responses were automated. Food rewards were delivered for responding under different conditions of reinforcement, which varied by procedure. Subjects received a successive series of sessions of nose poke acquisition training, discrimination training, and the delayed non-matching-to-position (DNTMP) memory procedure. Mixed repeated measures ANOVAs in which the between-subjects factor was group (ICSI vs. CTL) and the within-subjects factor was repeated exposures to learning procedures (i.e., sessions) were used to analyze data. Main results and the role of chanceIn comparisons between all mice (i.e., males and females combined), CTL mice exhibited superior performance relative to ICSI in response acquisition (p = 0.03), discrimination (p = 0.001), and memory (p = 0.007). Sex-specific comparisons between the groups yielded evidence of sexual dimorphism. ICSI females exhibited a deficit in acquisition learning relative to CTL females (p < 0.001) but there was not a significant difference between CTL and ICSI males. In the discrimination and memory tasks, ICSI males exhibited deficits relative to CTL males (p = 0.002 and p = 0.02, respectively) but the differences between females in these tasks were not significant. There was no difference in discrimination or memory retention/re-acquisition assessments conducted with mice at 12 months of age. ICSI males and females weighed significantly more than CTL counterparts at all points during the experiment. Limitations, reasons for cautionThe study was not blinded. All learning assessments utilized food reward; other assessments of operant, Pavlovian, and nonassociative learning are needed to fully characterize learning in ICSI mice and speculate regarding the implications for cognitive function in humans conceived via ICSI. Wider implications of the findingsStudying learning and memory processes in mouse models has the potential to shed light on ICSI outcomes at the level of cognitive function. Future research should use multiple learning paradigms, assess both males and females, and investigate the effects of variables related to the ICSI procedure. Studying cognitive function in ICSI is an interdisciplinary endeavor and requires coordination between researchers at the genetic and psychological levels of analysis. Study funding/competing interest(s)This work was supported, in part, by grants from NIH (P30GM110767, HD071736 and HD085506 to WY), the Templeton Foundation (Grant ID: 61174 to WY), and a New Scholarly Endeavor Grant from the University of Nevada, Reno Office of Research and Innovation (to ML, YW, HZ, LH, and WY). The authors declare no competing interests.

Habits in humans are commonly studied through outcome devaluation paradigms, but most existing tasks fail to capture the robustness of habitual behavior seen in animal models. I introduce two novel behavioral tasks designed to overcome these limitations. In the first task, ("shooting aliens task", n = 45), I simplified an existing instrumental learning task and implemented a novel intra-block reversal method in which stimulus positions changed unexpectedly within blocks while maintaining the same stimulus-action mappings. Participants also completed a classical devaluation phase with explicit reward changes. In the second task ("hands-attack task", n = 44), which relied on real-life avoidance behavior, devaluation was achieved by reversing reward contingencies and allowing participants to inhibit the dominant avoidance response in favor of a more effortful counterattack. Across both tasks, overtrained conditions led to more errors and longer response times after devaluation, confirming increased insensitivity to outcome change. Intra-block reversals in the shooting aliens task produced stronger habitual signatures than standard whole-block devaluation, revealing a greater cost of overriding automatic responses. In the hands-attack task, even without prior training, participants showed clear markers of habitual behavior, suggesting that real-world action patterns can replicate key features of laboratory habits. Interestingly, participants were more accurate in overriding overtrained responses when attacks were highly familiar, possibly due to enhanced perceptual processing, although this came at the cost of longer response times. These findings introduce two complementary tools that address key limitations in current paradigms: the intra-block reversal increases habit sensitivity without inflating working memory demands, while the hands-attack task captures naturalistic habit expression without artificial training, using a single, ecologically valid session. Both are suited for clinical applications, particularly where time constraints or cognitive load limit the feasibility of traditional approaches.

Noncognitive skills such as motivation and self-regulation, are partly heritable and predict academic achievement beyond cognitive skills. However, how the relationship between noncognitive skills and academic achievement changes over development is unclear. The current study examined how cognitive and noncognitive skills contribute to academic achievement from ages 7 to 16 in a sample of over 10,000 children from England and Wales. Noncognitive skills were increasingly predictive of academic achievement across development. Twin and polygenic scores analyses found that the contribution of noncognitive genetics to academic achievement became stronger over the school years. Results from within-family analyses indicated that associations with noncognitive genetics could not simply be attributed to confounding by environmental differences between nuclear families and are consistent with a possible role for evocative/active gene-environment correlations. By studying genetic effects through a developmental lens, we provide novel insights into the role of noncognitive skills in academic development.

Everyday activities often require learning sequences that necessitate the involvement of both the declarative and the procedural memory domains. Previous research has shown that a learning structure that is common across tasks from different domains can improve learning and resistance to interference. However, it remains unknown whether such shared learning structure can enhance longer-term memory retention. To address this question, forty-eight healthy adults participated in a pre-registered study in which they learned both an object sequence task (declarative learning) and a motor sequence task (procedural learning) in two separate sessions separated by 4h. Participants were assigned to either an associated group, where the two tasks shared a common learning structure - that consisted of a specific mapping between finger movements and object categories across learning sessions - or an unassociated group with no such cross-domain shared structure. Memory retention was assessed with a 24h retest session on both tasks. Contrary to our predictions, a shared higher-order structure between tasks from different domains did not enhance memory retention. Exploratory follow-up analyses revealed that the order the tasks were learned (i.e., object or motor first), rather than their structural overlap, influenced performance. Specifically, learning the motor task before the object task impaired the consolidation of the object task irrespective of whether the tasks shared a common learning structure or not. This effect was unidirectional as learning the object task before the motor task had no effect on the consolidation of the motor task. Altogether, the current findings suggest that the order of cross-domain learning experiences rather than their structure influences memory consolidation.

Stored memories are useless unless they are available for retrieval. Thus, investigating different ways to modulate retrieval is crucial. Novelty has been extensively studied as a modulator of memory. In this study, we investigated whether exposure to a novel event, an innovative neuroscience lesson, can enhance memory retrieval and divergent thinking in high school students. Across three experiments, we assessed the timing and mechanisms underlying these effects. In experiment 1, we found that memory retrieval was enhanced when the novel lesson occurred immediately before a memory test, but not when it was presented one hour earlier. In experiment 2, we found that the same immediate novelty exposure improved divergent thinking performance. Finally, in experiment 3, we explored potential shared mechanisms using a competition protocol and revealed that novelty improved divergent thinking regardless of its timing relative to memory retrieval. However, memory retrieval benefited only when tested immediately before the divergent thinking task. These results suggest that novelty boosts both memory retrieval and divergent thinking, but through partially distinct mechanisms. Our findings demonstrate that a simple, real-world classroom intervention can effectively enhance key cognitive functions in students. Significance StatementStored memories are only valuable if they can be retrieved, and memory retrieval plays a key role in creative thinking. Here, we tested whether a simple, novel event, a neuroscience lesson, could enhance memory retrieval and creative thinking in a real-world classroom setting. We found that novelty improved both memory retrieval and divergent thinking, an aspect of creative thinking, when presented immediately before the task. Finally, we revealed a non-reciprocal competition effect between memory retrieval and divergent thinking. These findings highlight a practical, low-cost intervention to boost key cognitive functions in students, demonstrating that brief, well-timed novel experiences can support both learning and creative thinking in educational environments.

Acquiring sequential information is of utmost importance, e.g., for language acquisition in children. Yet, the long-term storage of statistical learning in children is poorly understood. To address this question, 27 seven-year-olds and 28 young adults completed four sessions of visual sequence learning (Year 1). From this sample, 16 seven-year-olds and 20 young adults participated in another four equivalent sessions after a 12-month-delay (Year 2). The first three sessions of each year used stimulus set-1, while the last session used stimulus set-2 to investigate transfer effects. Each session consisted of alternating learning and test phases in a modified artificial grammar learning task. In Year 1, seven-year-olds and adults learned the regularities and showed transfer to stimulus set-2. Both groups retained their final performance level over the one-year-period. In Year 2, children and adults continued to improve with stimulus set-1, but did not show additional transfer gains. Adults overall outperformed children, but transfer effects were indistinguishable between both groups. The present results suggest that long-term memory traces are formed from repeated sequence learning which can be used to generalize sequence rules to new visual input. However, the present study did not provide evidence for a childhood advantage in learning and remembering sequence rules.

From a behavioral and neuronal perspective, observational and physical practice conditions have been theorized to be equivalent during motor task learning. However, some paradigms can challenge such a functional equivalence hypothesis. The perception of difficulties experienced by others may play a role in observational learning by allowing learners to partially distance themselves from these episodes, thereby limiting their impact on learning. In contrast, during physical practice, performance difficulties are directly experienced, which may constrain such distancing mechanisms. Indeed, an observer watching a model that uses a wrong physical strategy can ignore erroneous trials in order to preserve action encoding. The main goal of the present study was to prevent such observer avoidance and to test the cognitive and neuronal functional equivalence between the physical and observational practice groups. During this experiment, both groups learned two motor sequences. Only one sequence was repeatedly interrupted to perturb encoding. Behavioral results revealed that both groups were equally negatively impacted by such interruptions. Together, these findings suggest that while physical and observational practice can lead to comparable behavioral outcomes under strong disruption, they rely on partially distinct neural strategies. Physical practice predominantly engages motor and striato-cerebellar feedback loops, whereas observational learning relies more strongly on fronto-cerebellar and episodic memory networks, highlighting a context-dependent functional equivalence between learning modalities.

Skill learning involves the formation of stable motor patterns. In musical and athletic training, however, these stable motor habits can also impede the attainment of higher levels of performance. We developed an experimental paradigm to induce a specific motor pattern in the context of a discrete sequence production task and to investigate how these habits affect performance over a 3-week training period. Participants initially practiced small segments of 2 to 3 finger movements ("chunks") and then learned longer sequences composed of these chunks. This initial training induced a persistent temporal pattern during execution, with shorter inter-press-intervals within a chunk and longer ones at chunk boundaries. This pattern remained stable during the subsequent 10 days of training, in which participants were asked to produce the sequence as fast as possible from memory. The habit was also preserved when the sequences were directly displayed, removing the need for memory recall. We were able to induce chunking patterns that were either beneficial or detrimental to performance by taking into consideration the biomechanical constraints of the sequences. While we observed an overall reduction in the detrimental effect of the disadvantageous chunking instructions with training, our results show that the degree to which these detrimental chunk structures were maintained, was predictive of lower levels of final performance. In sum, we were able to induce beneficial and detrimental motor habits in a motor sequence production task and show that these initial instructions influenced performance outcomes over a prolonged period of time. Significance StatementA habit is defined as an automatized action that resists modification once sufficiently established. Preventing bad habits, while reinforcing good habits, is a key objective when teaching new motor skills. While habit formation is an integral part of motor skill acquisition, previous research has focused on habit formation in terms of action selection. In this paper, we examine habit formation in terms of motor skill execution, after the action has been selected. We were able to induce beneficial or detrimental motor habits in the production of motor sequences. Habits were stable over a prolonged training period. Our results demonstrate how cognitive instruction can lead to persistent motor habits and we explore how these habits are potentially modified with training.

According to deficit models, early life adversity disrupts normal development, leading to long-term emotional, behavioural, and cognitive difficulties. However, some evidence suggests that certain psychological skills may be preserved or even enhanced by early adversity. We hypothesised that implicit learning and memory would be equally effective in individuals exposed to childhood adversity and those from more favourable backgrounds, and compared the effects of childhood versus adult adversity. To this aim, retrospective childhood harshness and unpredictability measurements and current perceived socio-economic status were collected in a sample of 325 participants at a Hungarian university taking part in an online experiment. They also completed a task allowing the assessment of multiple components of implicit statistical learning, including initial acquisition of regularities, consolidation of established regularities, resistance of established regularities against interference, and acquisition of novel regularities. Results showed that although statistical learning reached the same eventual level, its pace was quicker in individuals with relatively greater early life adversity exposure. Conversely, lower current socio-economic status was linked to reduced learning performance. These findings partially support the hidden talents framework, suggesting that early adversity may promote certain adaptive cognitive skills.

Adolescence is a period marked by profound changes in both capacities for learning and the motivational drives that guide behavior. Motivated learning, including the ability to associate cues with actions that lead to positive or negative outcomes, is a fundamental component of adaptive behavior and is essential for survival. Equally important is the encoding of events during learning, which may be influenced by the valence of outcomes. Given the substantial neurocognitive changes in motivated learning and memory that occur from childhood to adulthood, adolescence provides a unique window to investigate mechanisms of these adaptive behaviors. Yet, we know surprisingly little about the development of these behaviors, with sparse extant research fraught with inconsistent findings. In this study, we examined motivated learning and incidental memory using a validated affective learning task in a sample of 174 participants aged 8 to 25 years. The task orthogonalized action and outcome valence and included incidental encoding of trial-unique images presented during feedback, followed by a delayed memory test. We show that adolescents outperform both children and adults in learning by leveraging Pavlovian response biases. In contrast, children exhibit enhanced memory for stimuli associated with positive outcomes compared to adolescents and adults. These findings point to distinct developmental advantages: enhanced learning performance in adolescence and enhanced memory for rewarding events in childhood, each potentially adaptive at their respective developmental stages. Together, these findings suggest opportunities to leverage learning and memory in youth for practical applications, such as education and policy setting.

Procedural memory facilitates the efficient processing of complex environmental stimuli and contributes to the acquisition of automatic behaviours and habits. Learning can occur intentionally or incidentally, yet, how the mode of learning affects procedural memory is still poorly understood. Importantly, procedural memory is a complex cognitive function composed of different subprocesses, including the acquisition and consolidation of statistical, frequency-based and sequential, order-based knowledge. Therefore, we tested how statistical and sequence knowledge develops during incidental versus intentional procedural memory formation and during consolidation. Seventy-four young adults performed either the uncued, incidental (N = 37) or the cued, intentional (N = 37) version of a probabilistic sequence learning task. Performance was retested after a 12-hour offline period, enabling us to test the effect of sleep on consolidation; therefore, half of the participants slept during the delay, while the other half had normal daily activity (PM-AM versus AM-PM design). The mode of learning (incidental versus intentional) had no effect on the acquisition of statistical knowledge, while intention to learn increased sequence learning performance. Consolidation was not affected by intention to learn: Both statistical and sequence knowledge was retained over the 12-hour delay, irrespective of the mode of learning and whether the delay included sleep or wake activity. These results suggest a time-dependent instead of sleep-dependent consolidation of both statistical and sequence knowledge. Our findings could contribute to a better understanding of how the mode of learning (intentional or incidental) affects procedural memory formation and consolidation.

People correct for movement errors when acquiring new motor skills (de novo learning) or adapting well-known movements (motor adaptation). These two motor learning types should be distinct, as de novo learning establishes new control policies while adaptation modifies existing ones. Here, we distinguish between these two motor learning types, and assess de novo learning retention and generalization. In study 1, participants train with both 30{degrees} visuomotor rotation and mirror reversal perturbations, to compare adaptation and de novo learning respectively. We find no perturbation order effects, and that learning develops with similar rates and comparable asymptotes for both perturbations. Explicit instructions also provide an advantage during early learning in both perturbations. However, mirror reversal learning shows larger inter-participant variability. Furthermore, movement initiation is slower for the mirror perturbation, and we only observe reach aftereffects following rotation training. In study 2, we use a browser-based mirror reversal task to investigate learning retention and generalization to the untrained hand and across the workspace. Learning persists across three or more days, substantially transfers to the untrained hand, and to targets on both sides of the mirror axis. Our results show that behavioral mechanisms underlying motor skill acquisition are distinct from adapting well-known movements.

Practice enhances motor acuity, enabling movement execution with greater speed and accuracy. However, the learning principles underlying improvements in speed, accuracy, and efficiency remain less understood than those supporting motor skill acquisition and adaptation. Here, we examined motor execution in a skill-based practice task to characterize learning, retention, and generalization of motor acuity. Using a gamified two-dimensional racing task, right-handed participants controlled a stylus-driven car along a curved track as quickly and accurately as possible. Across two studies (N = 83 total, 54 females), participants completed 300 training laps on Session 1 and returned for Session 2 to assess retention and generalization to novel track configurations: one with altered spatial configuration (rotated track) and one requiring movement in the opposite direction of training (reverse track). Movement speed improved rapidly and showed robust, though incomplete, retention across sessions. Speed improvements generalized substantially to both novel tracks. Accuracy was high at training onset and showed strong retention. However, we do not observe offline gains between sessions. Notably, accuracy declined transiently for the novel track configurations, suggesting interference from prior training. Movement efficiency, indexed by path length, was retained and generalized to the rotated track. However, reversing movement direction impaired efficiency, revealing a movement direction effect. This effect persisted when training direction was reversed in a second study, with counterclockwise movements remaining slower and less efficient than clockwise movements. These findings show that practice produces durable and broadly transferable motor execution improvements, while inherent movement direction biases constrain how improvements generalize across contexts. New & NoteworthyThe learning principles underlying improvements in motor acuity remain less well understood than those governing other forms of motor learning. Prior work suggests that motor execution improvements show limited generalization. In contrast, the present findings demonstrate that execution-based practice can produce robust, transferable gains, while also revealing a key constraint: inherent movement direction biases that limit generalization. By characterizing learning, retention, and generalization, this work provides new insight into how motor acuity improvements compare with skill acquisition and adaptation.

Memory consolidation has mainly been investigated for extended periods, from hours to days. Recent studies suggest that memory consolidation can also occur within shorter periods, from minutes to seconds. Our study aimed at determining (1) whether short rest periods lead to improvements in implicit probabilistic sequence learning and (2) whether length of rest duration influences such offline improvements. Participants performed an implicit probabilistic sequence learning task throughout 45 blocks. Between blocks, participants were allowed to rest and then to continue the task in their pace. The overall reaction times (general skill learning) shortened from pre- to post-rest periods, and this improvement was increased for longer rest durations. However, probabilistic sequences knowledge decreased in these periods, and this decrement was not related to the length of rest duration. These results suggest that (1) general skill learning but not probabilistic sequence knowledge benefits from short rest periods and, possibly, from memory consolidation, (2) ultra-fast offline improvements in general skills, but not forgetting in probabilistic sequence knowledge, are time-dependent. Overall, our findings highlight that ultra-fast consolidation differently affects distinct cognitive processes.

Musicians demonstrate advantages in acquiring motor sequences, showing faster learning and better explicit sequence knowledge than non-musicians. However, it is unclear whether this advantage extends beyond acquisition to the consolidation phase, which is when newly learned skills stabilize and become resistant to interference. Additionally, while interference from executing competing motor tasks is well-established, less is known about whether purely sensory information presented after learning can disrupt consolidation of a bimodal motor sequence. We investigated how post-acquisition sensory interference affects performance of a learned audio-visual sequence, and whether musical training moderates this vulnerability. Participants first learned an explicit sequence in a serial reaction time task using synchronous, informative audio-visual cues. After a brief consolidation period, they were randomly assigned to one of four observational conditions that manipulated the relationship between auditory and visual streams. Motor performance was then reassessed. Post-acquisition sensory interference impaired subsequent motor performance, but this effect was modality-specific: it was driven primarily by manipulations to the task-relevant visual stream, while auditory interference alone had no credible effect. Distributional analysis revealed that learning involved a strategic shift from reactive to anticipatory responding. Critically, participants with musical training showed an earlier and consistently higher reliance on anticipatory responses than those without, demonstrating a more rapid adoption of predictive motor control. These findings demonstrate that newly formed sensorimotor memories are selectively vulnerable to interference in task-relevant modalities. Furthermore, our work provides a candidate mechanistic account for the musician advantage in sequence learning, linking it to faster development of predictive motor strategies during consolidation.

Integrating new words into an existing semantic network is a core challenge of second language (L2) acquisition. We investigated how evidence-based learning strategies and individual performance shape the neurocognitive dynamics of vocabulary learning. Eighty- three adults with German or French as their native language (L1) learned 48 Finnish (L2) nouns over 14 days using a mobile app that systematically varied retrieval practice, corrective feedback, multisensory learning, and distributed learning. Before and after training, EEG was recorded during a translation recognition task designed to elicit the N400, an index of semantic integration. Vocabulary accuracy increased from 0.41% pre-learning to 75.5% post- learning (dz = 3.96), and the N400 incongruity effect increased significantly, F(1, 75) = 99.52, p < .001, {superscript 2}g = .32, reflecting successful integration of new L2 words into the mental lexicon. High performers showed larger N400 responses and distinct ERP template-map preponderance (i.e., the proportion of epoch time points assigned to a given template map) indicating more efficient and specialized neural processing. Despite systematic manipulation of learning strategies, no single approach yielded consistent behavioral or neural advantages, suggesting that overall exposure and cumulative practice--rather than any specific strategy-- were the key drivers of robust learning. ERP template-map analyses further revealed that learning not only amplified neural responses but also shifted the preponderance of maps in the N400 window, signaling a qualitative reorganization of semantic processing. These findings bridge cognitive neuroscience and language education, suggesting that the depth and success of vocabulary learning may depend more on the degree of integration achieved than on the specific instructional strategy employed.

Although adults learn foreign languages more slowly than children, behavioral improvements can still emerge rapidly with training. Previous phonetic learning studies have mostly focused on pre- and post-training comparisons, leaving daily learning trajectories largely unexplored. Here, in Finnish speakers naive to tone languages, we tracked day-to-day changes in Mandarin tone perception during a short training program (1 h/day for 4 days), complemented by pre- and post-training behavioral and event-related potential (ERP) measures. Each learning session comprised exposure to Mandarin tones in continuous and isolated speech with cues, change detection and identification with feedback, and a listen-and-repeat exercise. To assess the role of co-presence, participants learned either in pairs (n = 22) or individually (n = 20). We found that discrimination and categorization speed, as well as discrimination accuracy, improved from pre-to posttest, with performance also increasing across daily training sessions. Paired learners showed higher sensitivity (d') to tone changes on the first day than individual learners, consistent with co-presence-driven attentional facilitation. At the neural level, P3a amplitude to tone changes during passive listening increased after training, reflecting enhanced automatic orienting to novel sounds at whole group level. These findings demonstrate that short-term training induces rapid behavioral gains and selective neural plasticity in adult phonetic learning, with early co-presence effects and transfer to novel speech sounds.

People differ in how quickly they learn and adapt sensorimotor skills, and these differences have been linked to individual variation in working memory capacity (WMc). In tasks that can be supported by cognitive strategies, visuospatial WMc has been proposed as a key contributor. However, it remains unclear whether this association reflects domain-specific mechanisms or domain-general executive resources, and whether it extends beyond spatial memory to other visual features. Here, we systematically tested whether domain-specific or domain-general WMc predicts adaptation across three visuomotor adaptation (VMA) tasks known to differentially engage explicit and implicit learning systems. After obtaining independent measures of spatial and feature-based WMc, healthy subjects completed (1) a standard VMA task, which engages both explicit and implicit learning systems; (2) a delayed feedback VMA task, which isolates explicit learning; and (3) a clamped feedback VMA task, which isolates implicit learning. Our results provide converging evidence in support of a domain-specific association between spatial WMc and individual differences in learning. In Experiments 1 and 2, greater spatial WMc was associated with robust increases in explicit learning whereas featured-based WMc was not associated with learning outcomes. Surprisingly, in Experiment 3, greater spatial WMc was associated with reduced implicit learning, suggesting an interaction between latent cognitive capacities and implicit learning not accounted for by traditional models. These results shed light on the precise cognitive mechanisms underlying sensorimotor adaptation and provide novel insight into domain-specific links between spatial WM and motor learning.