Discriminating between action memories: children's use of kinesthetic cues and visible consequences

The present experiments examined the sorts of cues that might be available to facilitate children's ability to discriminate between memories for their own actions. In Experiment 1, 7 and 10 year olds engaged in two types of tracing exercises (using a pencil and a finger; a stylus and a finger; or a stylus and a pencil). Discrimination performance was better when distinguishing between memories involving the use of a pencil vs. a finger than in either of the other two cases. In Experiment 2, children traced and imagined tracing pictures using one of these three tools. Discriminations between memories for tracing and imagined tracing varied with the type of tool involved and interacted with the type of tracing activity (tracing vs. imagining). These differences in discrimination performance demonstrated the importance of kinesthetic cues and visible consequences for children's memory discriminations.     

Discriminating memories for actual and imagined taste experiences: a reality monitoring approach

Blindfolded subjects tasted 4 common fruits and imagined the taste of 4 others while focusing on either a few (low sensory detail [SD] or many (high SD) of the fruit's sensory qualities. One week later, subjects judged whether each of 12 fruit names represented a fruit that was previously tasted, imagined tasted, or new (reality monitoring). The major finding was a significant interaction between source (imagined, perceived) and SD level (low, high). Source monitoring was accurate for imagined and perceived fruits in the low SD condition and for perceived fruits in the high SD condition. As predicted, subjects tended to misattribute memories for imagined fruits to perception in the high SD condition. The findings are discussed with reference to the Johnson-Raye reality monitoring model and recent work on memory source confusions.     

The unpredictable past: spontaneous autobiographical memories outnumber autobiographical memories retrieved strategically

Involuntary autobiographical memories are spontaneously arising memories of personal events, whereas voluntary memories are retrieved strategically. Voluntary remembering has been studied in numerous experiments while involuntary remembering has been largely ignored. It is generally assumed that voluntary recall is the standard way of remembering, whereas involuntary recall is the exception. However, little is known about the actual frequency of these two types of remembering in daily life. Here, 48 Danish undergraduates recorded their involuntary versus voluntary autobiographical memories during a day using a mechanical counter. Involuntary memories were reported three times as frequently as voluntary memories. Compared to voluntary memories, they were associated less with problem solving and social sharing and more with day dreaming, periods of boredom, no reasons for remembering and predominantly came to mind during unfocused attention. The findings suggest that involuntary recall is a typical way of accessing the personal past.     

The psychodiagnostic value of children's earliest memories

Examined the early memories of 94 boys, aged 8 through 11, with varying levels of psychopathology. Via a newly developed early memory scoring system, subjects were classified according to degree of presenting psychopathology at a highly significant level. The scoring system classifications were also more accurate than those made by experienced clinicians. The importance of scoring system structural variables in making adjustment/maladjustment decisions was emphasized.     

Event plausibility does not determine children's false memories

In this paper we ask how the plausibility of an event affects the likelihood that children will develop a false memory for it. Over three interviews 6-year-olds and 10-year-olds were shown two true photos and two false photos-a plausible and less plausible event-and reported what they could remember about those events. Children also rated their confidence that the events happened, and how much they could remember about the events. By the final interview, within each age group, there were no differences in children's confidence ratings for the two false events. In addition, within each age group, the rate of false memories was the same for each event; across age groups, younger children developed more false memories than older children.     

Event plausibility does not determine children's false memories

In this paper we ask how the plausibility of an event affects the likelihood that children will develop a false memory for it. Over three interviews 6-year-olds and 10-year-olds were shown two true photos and two false photos—a plausible and less plausible event—and reported what they could remember about those events. Children also rated their confidence that the events happened, and how much they could remember about the events. By the final interview, within each age group, there were no differences in children's confidence ratings for the two false events. In addition, within each age group, the rate of false memories was the same for each event; across age groups, younger children developed more false memories than older children.     

Mothers' negative evaluations of their children's performances enhance boys' memories for crafts

The authors predicted that mothers' evaluative comments would affect their preschool-aged children's learning during a craft-making activity. Each mother (N = 67) taught her child 6 crafts in a playroom in a university setting. Three weeks later, the child returned to the playroom to redo the crafts. Evaluators tested the children's memories of the procedures for completing the crafts. The authors used videotapes of the mothers' teaching to code for statements that positively evaluated their children's performances (praise) or that negatively evaluated their children's performances (criticism). Maternal praise did not affect children's memories. Maternal criticism did not affect their daughters' memories. However, sons were more likely to more accurately redo craft steps for which their mothers had made at least 1 comment criticizing their performances. The authors proposed that emotional arousal was a reason for girls' and boys' differential responses to maternal criticism.     

No evidence for overgeneral memories in borderline personality disorder

The hypothesis that borderline personality disorder (BPD) is related to overgeneral memories was tested in a mixed sample of 39 patients. A memory test with emotional cue words and the instruction to produce specific autobiographical memories was used. Specificity was judged by an independent rater. Regression analyses indicated that age and major depressive disorder were related to the production of less specific memories, whereas educational level and presence of personality disorder were positivily related to number of specific memories. Borderline personality disorder, anxiety disorders and childhood traumas were not related to number of specific memories.     

Dividing attention lowers children's but increases adults' false memories

The present study examined the impact of divided attention on children's and adults' neutral and negative true and false memories in a standard Deese/Roediger-McDermott paradigm. Children (7- and 11-year-olds; n = 126) and adults (n = 52) received 5 neutral and 5 negative Deese/Roediger-McDermott word lists; half of each group also received a divided attention task. The results showed that divided attention affected children's and adults' false memory levels differently but did not alter true memory differently. Our results revealed a developmental shift in that divided attention lowered children's false memory rates but increased adults' false memory rates, regardless of the nature of the material (i.e., neutral or negative). Our study indicates that manipulations that target conscious processing (e.g., divided attention) result in marked qualitative and quantitative differences between children's and adults' false memories but not true memories.     

Thirty-five-month-old children have spontaneous memories despite change of context for retrieval

ABSTRACT

Many parents have experienced incidents in which their preschool child spontaneously (i.e., without prompting of any kind) recall a previously experienced event. Until recently, such spontaneous memories had only been examined in non-controlled settings (e.g., diary studies). Using a novel experimental paradigm, a previous study has shown that when young children are brought back to a highly distinct setting (same room, same experimenter, same furnishing), in which they previously experienced an interesting event (a Teddy or a Game event), spontaneous memories can be triggered. However, exactly which cues (or combination of cues) are effective for the children’s memory, remains unknown. Here, we used this novel paradigm to examine the possible impact of contextual cues at the time of retrieval. We manipulated whether the 35-month-old children returned to the same room (n?=?40) or to a different, but similarly furnished, room (n?=?40) after one week. The results revealed that although the children returning to a new room produced fewer spontaneous memories than the children returning to the same room, the difference was not significant. Interestingly, despite changing rooms, the children still produced spontaneous memories. Taken together the results may shed new light on the mechanisms underlying childhood amnesia.     

Evidence for spontaneous retrieval of suspended but not finished prospective memories

McDaniel and Einstein (2007) argued that prospective memories can be retrieved through spontaneous retrieval processes stimulated by the presence of a target cue. To test this claim, we investigated whether presenting a prospective memory cue during a task that did not require an intention to be performed spontaneously triggered remembering of that intention. In two experiments, participants performed an image-rating task in which a prospective memory task (to press the “Q” key when a target word appeared) was embedded. Then, participants were told that their intention was finished or suspended. Finally, participants performed a lexical decision task in which each target (and a matched control) word appeared. RTs were slower to target words than to control words when the intention was suspended but not when it was finished. These results suggest that target cues associated with suspended intentions can spontaneously trigger remembering but that finished intentions are quickly deactivated.     

Abducted by a UFO: prevalence information affects young children's false memories for an implausible event

This study examined whether prevalence information promotes children's false memories for an implausible event. Forty‐four 7–8 and forty‐seven 11–12 year old children heard a true narrative about their first school day and a false narrative about either an implausible event (abducted by a UFO) or a plausible event (almost choking on a candy). Moreover, half of the children in each condition received prevalence information in the form of a false newspaper article while listening to the narratives. Across two interviews, children were asked to report everything they remembered about the events. In both age groups, plausible and implausible events were equally likely to give rise to false memories. Prevalence information increased the number of false memories in 7–8 year olds, but not in 11–12 year olds at Interview 1. Our findings demonstrate that young children can easily develop false memories of a highly implausible event. Copyright © 2008 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Emotional memories are not all created equal: evidence for selective memory enhancement

Human brain imaging studies have shown that greater amygdala activation to emotional relative to neutral events leads to enhanced episodic memory. Other studies have shown that fearful faces also elicit greater amygdala activation relative to neutral faces. To the extent that amygdala recruitment is sufficient to enhance recollection, these separate lines of evidence predict that recognition memory should be greater for fearful relative to neutral faces. Experiment 1 demonstrated enhanced memory for emotionally negative relative to neutral scenes; however, fearful faces were not subject to enhanced recognition across a variety of delays (15 min to 2 wk). Experiment 2 demonstrated that enhanced delayed recognition for emotional scenes was associated with increased sympathetic autonomic arousal, indexed by the galvanic skin response, relative to fearful faces. These results suggest that while amygdala activation may be necessary, it alone is insufficient to enhance episodic memory formation. It is proposed that a sufficient level of systemic arousal is required to alter memory consolidation resulting in enhanced recollection of emotional events.     

Hemispheric asymmetries in semantic processing: evidence from false memories for ambiguous words

We used fMRI to investigate competition during language production in two word production tasks: object naming and color naming of achromatic line drawings. Generally, fMRI activation was higher for color naming. The line drawings were followed by a word (the distractor word) that referred to either the object, a related object, or an unrelated object. The effect of the distractor word on the BOLD response was qualitatively different for the two tasks. The activation pattern suggests two different kinds of competition during lexical retrieval: (1) Task-relevant responses (e.g., red in color naming) compete with task-irrelevant responses (i.e., the object’s name). This competition effect was dominant in prefrontal cortex. (2) Multiple task-relevant responses (i.e., target word and distractor word) compete for selection. This competition effect was dominant in ventral temporal cortex. This study provides further evidence for the distinct roles of frontal and temporal cortex in language production, while highlighting the effects of competition, albeit from different sources, in both regions.     

The influence of reporting mode on children's cued personal memories

The Autobiographical Memory Test (AMT) is widely used in research contexts to measure the extent to which participants (children or adults) report specific or general memories in response to cue words. Recalling fewer specific and more general memories (overgeneral memory) has been shown to be linked to depression in adults, but findings for youth, in particular, are mixed. Different versions of the AMT may be one contributing factor, yet this issue has received little research attention. The current study investigated the influence of reporting mode (written vs. spoken) on the specificity, length, and content of memories provided by 8- to 10-year-old children (N?=?48). No significant differences were found in the number of specific responses given in the written and spoken modes. On the other hand, the spoken mode elicited longer and more detailed memories, although most content differences were eliminated when memory length was controlled. These findings suggest that different reporting modes can influence the nature of the memories reported, but the absolute differences are relatively small.     

Belief inhibition in children's reasoning: memory-based evidence

Adult reasoning has been shown as mediated by the inhibition of intuitive beliefs that are in conflict with logic. The current study introduces a classic procedure from the memory field to investigate belief inhibition in 12- to 17-year-old reasoners. A lexical decision task was used to probe the memory accessibility of beliefs that were cued during thinking on syllogistic reasoning problems. Results indicated an impaired memory access for words associated with misleading beliefs that were cued during reasoning if syllogisms had been solved correctly. This finding supports the claim that even for younger reasoners, correct reasoning is mediated by inhibitory processing as soon as intuitive beliefs conflict with logical considerations.     

气质与父母养育对儿童社会适应的交互作用:代表性理论及其证据

最佳适配理论、素质-压力模型、差别易感模型从不同视角阐述了气质、养育方式在儿童社会适应行为中的交互作用机制。最佳适配理论强调气质特质与父母养育方式的良好匹配能促进儿童的社会适应,而不良匹配则会带来适应问题。素质-压力模型强调在不利父母养育条件下,具有"风险"气质特质的儿童更容易出现适应不良,而对"弹性"气质的儿童影响不大。差别易感模型则认为儿童"易感"的气质特质在良好的抚养条件下表现得"更好",而在不利的抚养环境中表现得"更差"。围绕三种代表性理论及其实证研究结果,对当前最新研究结果进行了分析和总结,进一步细分了儿童社会化过程中的风险因素和保护性因素。从气质与积极养育方式的交互作用、养育过程中父母角色分工的差异,以及气质与养育方式动态作用机制三个方面指出了将来进一步探索的方向。     

How children remember neutral and emotional pictures: boundary extension in children's scene memories

Boundary extension is the tendency to remember more of a scene than was actually shown. The dominant interpretation of this memory illusion is that it originates from schemata that people construct when viewing a scene. Evidence of boundary extension has been obtained primarily with adult participants who remember neutral pictures. The current study addressed the developmental stability of this phenomenon. Therefore, we investigated whether children aged 10-12 years display boundary extension for neutral pictures. Moreover, we examined emotional scene memory. Eighty-seven children drew pictures from memory after they had seen either neutral or emotional pictures. Both their neutral and emotional drawings revealed boundary extension. Apparently, the schema construction that underlies boundary extension is a robust and ubiquitous process.