Reexposure breeds recall: effects of experience on 9-month-olds' ordered recall

On the basis of three experiences, 9-month-olds recall specific events after one month. We tested whether multiple experiences are necessary, or merely facilitative, of 9-month-olds' long-term recall. In two experiments, using deferred imitation, infants were exposed to multi-step sequences either one time, two times, or three times prior to a one-month delay. In Experiment 1, regardless of the number of experiences, infants did not demonstrate recall. In Experiment 2, infants were tested on and reexposed to the events after one week; recall was tested again one month later. Performance after 1 week in Experiment 2 was greater than performance after one month in Experiment 1. Moreover, presumably as a function of reexposure after one week, infants recalled the individual actions of the events one month later. Infants in the three-experience condition also evidenced ordered recall after one month. Implications for the developmental status of the neural substrate supporting long-term recall are discussed.     

Mental Reinstatement of Context: Do individual differences in mental time travel and eyewitness occupation influence eyewitness performance over different delay intervals?

The Cognitive Interview is a memory‐enhancing interview protocol designed to optimise the access and retrieval of eyewitness memories. Its Mental Reinstatement of Context (MRC) component requires interviewees to mentally reconstruct the crime event they witnessed. Individual differences in mental time travel (MTT) relate to the extent to which a person mentally re‐experiences personal events from his or her past. Individual differences in MTT have been found to predict correct recall of a simulated crime event under immediate MRC recall conditions. To explore the relationship between MTT and performance under MRC conditions further, the present study presented a simulated crime video to 30 police officers and 26 members of the public. Eyewitness recall was tested under MRC conditions either immediately or 1 week later. Participants' general MTT and also MTT relating specifically to the crime video itself were measured via self‐report. Less correct information and more confabulations were produced after 1 week, but delay had no effect on the amount of incorrect information reported. No difference in recall was found between police officers and members of the public. Better quality MTT relating to the crime video was found to be a positive predictor of the amount of information correctly recalled under immediate conditions but not after 1 week. General MTT scores did not predict correct recall under either delay condition. Interviewers need to be aware that, due to individual differences, some witnesses may perform better under the MRC component than others.     

Enhancing children's event recall after long delays

The effects of context reinstatement as means of enhancing 5‐ and 6‐year‐old children's event memory in repeated interviews after a 6‐month delay were examined. Children were interviewed immediately after the event (baseline interview) and twice at a 6‐month delay, with 24 hours between interviews. The first 6‐month interview was conducted in a perfect‐context reinstatement (n = 15), imperfect‐context reinstatement (n = 16), or no‐context reinstatement (n = 15) condition. The second 6‐month interview was conducted 24 hours later with no‐context reinstatement for all children. Context reinstatement attenuated the effects of delay on recall. The accuracy of the details reported was greater in the perfect‐context compared to the imperfect‐context and no‐context conditions. Details repeated between the immediate‐baseline interview and in the first 6‐month interview were more accurate than details repeated between the first and second 6‐month interview. There was no increase in recall (hypermnesia) across the first and second 6‐month interviews in any condition. Practical implications of these findings are discussed. Copyright © 2006 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

The Editing Density of Moving Images Influences Viewers’ Time Perception: The Mediating Role of Eye Movements

The present study examined whether cinematographic editing density affects viewers’ perception of time. As a second aim, based on embodied models that conceive time perception as strictly connected to the movement, we tested the hypothesis that the editing density of moving images also affects viewers’ eye movements and that these later mediate the effect of editing density on viewers’ temporal judgments. Seventy participants watched nine video clips edited by manipulating the number of cuts (slow- and fast-paced editing against a master shot, unedited condition). For each editing density, multiple video clips were created, representing three different kinds of routine actions. The participants’ eye movements were recorded while watching the video, and the participants were asked to report duration judgments and subjective passage of time judgments after watching each clip. The results showed that participants subjectively perceived that time flew more while watching fast-paced edited videos than slow-paced or unedited videos; by contrast, concerning duration judgments, participants overestimated the duration of fast-paced videos compared to the master-shot videos. Both the slow- and the fast-paced editing generated shorter fixations than the master shot, and the fast-paced editing led to shorter fixations than the slow-paced editing. Finally, compared to the unedited condition, editing led to an overestimation of durations through increased eye mobility. These findings suggest that the editing density of moving images by increasing the number of cuts effectively altered viewers’ experience of time and add further evidence to prior research showing that performed eye movement is associated with temporal judgments.     

Total retrieval time and hypermnesia: Investigating the benefits of multiple recall tests

Hypermnesia is an increase in recall over repeated tests. A core issue is the role of repeated testing, per se, versus total retrieval time. Prior research implies an equivalence between multiple recall tests and a single test of equal total duration, but theoretical analyses indicate otherwise. Three experiments investigated this issue using various study materials (unrelated word lists, related word lists, and a short story). In the first experimental session, the study phase was followed by a series of short recall tests or by a single, long test of equal total duration. Two days later, participants took a final recall test. The multiple and single test conditions produced equivalent performance in the first session, but the multiple test group exhibited less forgetting and fewer item losses in the final test. In a fourth experiment, using a brief delay (15 min) between the recall sessions, the multiple recall condition produced greater hypermnesia as well as fewer item losses. In addition, final recall was significantly higher in the multiple than in the single test condition in three of the four experiments. Thus, single and repeated recall tests of equal total duration are not functionally equivalent, but rather produce differences observable in subsequent recall tests.     

The effects of rapport‐building style on children's reports of a staged event

Three‐ to nine‐year‐old children (n=144) interacted with a photographer and were interviewed about the event either a week or a month later. The informativeness and accuracy of information provided following either open‐ended or direct rapport building were compared. Children in the open‐ended rapport‐building condition provided more accurate reports than children in the direct rapport‐building condition after both short and long delays. Open‐ended rapport‐building led the three‐ to four‐year‐olds to report more errors in response to the first recall question about the event, but they went on to provide more accurate reports in the rest of the interview than counterparts in the direct rapport‐building condition. These results suggest that forensic interviewers should attempt to establish rapport with children using an open‐ended style. Published in 2004 by John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

The effect of cognitive reappraisal on long‐term emotional experience and emotional memory

One's ability to properly regulate emotion is critical to psychological and physical well‐being. Among various strategies to regulate emotion, cognitive reappraisal has been shown to modulate both emotional experience and emotional memory. However, most studies of reappraisal have focused on reappraisal of negative situations, with reappraisal of positive emotion receiving considerably less attention. In addition, the effects of reappraisal on emotional reactions to stimuli are typically only assessed either immediately or after a short delay, and it remains unclear whether reappraisal effects persist over longer time periods. We investigated the effect of cognitive reappraisal on emotional reactions and long‐term episodic memory for positive and negative stimuli. Men and women viewed emotionally negative, positive, and neutral pictures while they were instructed to either increase, decrease, or maintain the initial emotional reactions elicited by the pictures. Subjective ratings of emotional valence and arousal were assessed during the regulation task and again after 1 week. Memory for the pictures was assessed with free recall. Results indicated that pictures accompanied by instructions to increase emotion were better recalled than pictures reappraised to decrease emotion. Modulation of emotional arousal elicited by stimuli persisted over a week, but this effect was observed only for men. These findings suggest that cognitive reappraisal can have long‐lasting effects on emotional reactions to stimuli. However, the sex differences observed for the effects of reappraisal on emotional reactions highlight the importance of considering individual differences in the effects of regulation.     

Positive and negative generation effects,hypermnesia, and total recall time

Self-generated information is typically remembered better than perceived information (the generation effect). Experimental design produces an important limiting condition for this effect: Generation enhances recall in within-subjects designs, but typically not in between-subjects designs. However, Mulligan (2001) found that the generation effect emerged over repeated recall tests in a between-subjects design, calling into question the generality of this limiting condition. Two experiments further delineated the emergent generation effect Experiment 1 demonstrated that this effect does not require multiple discrete recall tests but may emerge on a single recall test of long duration. Experiment 2 demonstrated that the negative generation effect (a reversal of the typical generation effect produced under certain conditions) is abolished by multiple recall tests. In both experiments, the generate condition produced greater hypemnesia (increased recall over tests) than did the read condition.     

Intoxicated Witnesses: Testing the Validity of the Alcohol Myopia Theory

In an assessment of the Alcohol Myopia Theory (AMT), the effects of alcohol on an eyewitness's recall of high‐salience and low‐salience details were investigated. In a laboratory, Study 1 participants watched a staged videoed theft whilst either sober (control or placebo), above (M_BAC = 0.09%) or below (M_BAC = 0.06%) the UK drink‐drive limit. A week later, a free recall and recognition tests were completed. Intoxication was not found to reduce recall accuracy using either recall task. In Study 2, whilst on a night out, participants watched the videoed theft with high (M_BAC = 0.14%) or low (M_BAC = 0.05%) blood alcohol concentrations (BACs). A week later, the free recall and recognition tests were attempted. High BACs were seen to impair recall when memory was assessed through free recall but not with the recognition test. Neither study found the attention narrowing predicted by AMT using either recall technique, although poor recall for low‐salience details in all groups may have contributed to this result. Copyright © 2016 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Classroom experiments on the effects of different noise sources and sound levels on long‐term recall and recognition in children

A total of 1358 children aged 12–14 years participated in ten noise experiments in their ordinary classrooms and were tested for recall and recognition of a text exactly one week later. Single and combined noise sources were presented for 15 min at 66 dBA L_eq (equivalent noise level). Single source presentations of aircraft and road traffic noise were also presented at 55 dBA L_eq. Data were analysed between subjects since the first within‐subjects analysis revealed a noise after‐effect or a asymmetric transfer effect. Overall, there was a strong noise effect on recall, and a smaller, but significant effect on recognition. In the single‐source studies, aircraft and road traffic noise impaired recall at both noise levels. Train noise and verbal noise did not affect recognition or recall. Some of the pairwise combinations of aircraft noise with train or road traffic, with one or the other as the dominant source, interfered with recall and recognition. Item difficulty, item position and ability did not interact with the noise effect. Arousal, distraction, perceived effort, and perceived difficulty in reading and learning did not mediate the effects on recall and recognition. Copyright © 2003 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Secrecy and suggestibility: are children's memories for secrets less suggestible than other memories?

Adult secrecy research has found a memory‐enhancing effect for information kept secret as the secret is mentally rehearsed each time the adult is required to prevent it being reported (e.g. Lane & Wegner, 1994). The present study examined possible memory‐enhancing effects of children keeping information secret. Two hundred and thirty two five to eight year olds took part in a puppet‐making task. During the task the puppet‐maker sprayed glitter onto the puppets. Half the children were told to keep a secret (that the spray had been taken from Disneyland) and the other half (the control group) were merely told the spray was from Disneyland. One week later the children were interviewed either by the puppet‐maker (the secret‐giver) or by the puppet‐maker's friend (the secret‐novice). The five to six year olds showed no effect of the secret condition, whereas the seven to eight year olds made significantly less errors in their free recall in the secret condition compared to the control condition. There was no effect of the secret condition on children's suggestibility to leading questions. However, both age groups were significantly more suggestible when interviewed by the secret‐giver. Finally, both age groups showed a recall deficit in the secret condition. Copyright © 2004 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

The effect of overlearning on long‐term retention

Once material has been learned to a criterion of one perfect trial, further study within the same session constitutes overlearning. Although overlearning is a popular learning strategy, its effect on long‐term retention is unclear. In two experiments presented here, 218 college students learned geography facts (Experiment 1) or word definitions (Experiment 2). The degree of learning was manipulated and measured via multiple test‐with‐feedback trials, and participants returned for a final cued recall test between 1 and 9 weeks later. The overlearners recalled far more than the low learners at the 1‐week test, but this difference decreased dramatically thereafter. These data suggest that overlearning (and its concomitant demand for additional study time) is an inefficient strategy for learning material for meaningfully long periods of time. Copyright © 2004 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Background music as a quasi clock in retrospective duration judgments

The segmentation-change model of time perception proposes that individuals engaged in cognitive tasks during a given interval of time retrospectively estimate duration by recalling events that occurred during the interval and inferring each event's duration. Previous research suggests that individuals can recall the number of songs heard during an interval and infer the length of each song, exactly the conditions that foster estimates of duration based on the segmentation-change model. The results of a laboratory experiment indicated that subjects who solved word-search puzzles for 20 min. estimated the duration of the interval to be longer when 8 short songs (<3 min.) as opposed to 4 long songs (6+ min.) were played in the background, regardless of whether the musical format was Contemporary Dance or New Age. Assuming each song represented a distinct segment in memory, these results are consistent with the segmentation-change model. These results suggest that background music may not always reduce estimates of duration by drawing attention away from the passage of time. Instead, background music may actually expand the subjective length of an interval by creating accessible traces in memory, which are retrospectively used to infer duration.     

Linking actions and emotions: Evidence from 15‐ and 18‐month‐old infants

This study investigated 15‐ and 18‐month‐olds' understanding of the link between actions and emotions. Infants watched a videotape in which three adult models performed an action on an object. Each adult expressed the same emotion (positive, negative, or neutral affect) on completion of the action. Infants were subsequently given 20 seconds to interact with the object. Infants were less likely to perform the target action after the models' expressed negative as opposed to positive or neutral affect. Although infants' imitative behaviour was influenced by the models' emotional displays, this social referencing effect was not apparent in their more general object‐directed behaviour. For instance, infants in the negative emotion condition were just as quick to touch the object and spent the same amount of time touching the object as did infants in the neutral and positive emotion conditions. These findings suggest that infants understood that the models' negative affect was in response to the action, rather than the object itself. Infants apparently used this negative emotional information to appraise the action as one that was ‘undesirable’ or ‘bad’. Consequently, infants were now loath to reproduce the action themselves.     

Does providing props during preparation help children to remember a novel event?

We investigated the conditions under which preparatory information presented 1 day before a novel event influenced 6-year-olds' recall 1 week later. Children were assigned to one of six experimental conditions. Three conditions involved preparatory information that described the event accurately but differed according to the presence and type of props (verbal, real props, and toy props). In two conditions, which also differed according to whether verbal information was supplemented with real props, half of the preparatory information described the event accurately, whereas the other half was thematically similar to, but inconsistent with, the event (misleading verbal and misleading props). Compared with the attentional control condition, all forms of preparation that described the event accurately increased correct recall. Preparation that included props improved photograph recognition. When half of the accurate information was replaced by misleading information, the positive benefit on recall was reduced, and when misleading props accompanied the misleading information, errors increased. The potential underlying mechanisms and implications for pediatric settings are discussed.     

Eye Remember What Happened: Eye‐Closure Improves Recall of Events but not Face Recognition

Eye‐closure improves event recall. We investigated whether eye‐closure can also facilitate subsequent performance on lineup identification (Experiment 1) and face recognition tasks (Experiment 2). In Experiment 1, participants viewed a theft, recalled the event with eyes open or closed, mentally rehearsed the perpetrator's face with eyes open or closed, and viewed a target‐present or target‐absent lineup. Eye‐closure improved event recall, but did not significantly affect lineup identification accuracy. Experiment 2 employed a face recognition paradigm with high statistical power to permit detection of potentially small effects. Participants viewed 20 faces and were later asked to recognize the faces. Thirty seconds before the recognition task, participants either completed an unrelated distracter task (control condition), or were instructed to think about the face with their eyes open (rehearsal condition) or closed (eye‐closure condition). We found no differences between conditions in discrimination accuracy or response criterion. Potential explanations and practical implications are discussed. Copyright © 2015 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.