RECOLLECTION AND RECONSTRUCTION IN CHILDREN'S AUTOBIOGRAPHIC MEMORY.
Item
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Title
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RECOLLECTION AND RECONSTRUCTION IN CHILDREN'S AUTOBIOGRAPHIC MEMORY.
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Identifier
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AAI8501140
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identifier
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8501140
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Creator
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HUDSON, JUDITH ANNE.
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Contributor
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Katherine Nelson
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Date
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1984
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Language
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English
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Publisher
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City University of New York.
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Subject
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Psychology, Developmental
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Abstract
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This study tested a schematic processing model of autobiographic memory in which autobiographic memories are conceived of as the products of constructive memory processes, guided by general knowledge structures such as event schemas or scripts.;Sixty nursery-school children (mean age 4,7) and 58 kindergarten children (mean age 5,8) participated in either a single creative movement workshop (the episodic condition) or a series of 4 workshops (the script condition) and recalled workshops one month later. It was predicted that children in the script condition would acquire a script for the event which would organize their long-term recall of particular workshops. Rehearsal and cueing were also manipulated in order to test for effects of these factors on autobiographic memory.;Although immediate recall was unaffected by condition, there were marked differences in children's recall in the script and episodic conditions after 4 weeks. Children in the script condition recalled more than children in the episodic condition; children in each condition recalled different types of activities; and children in the script condition confused activities occurring in different workshops. Older children remembered more than younger children and generalized more in both conditions, but effects of constructive processing were evident at both ages.;While rehearsal and specific cues increased recall in both conditions, these interventions did not improve accuracy in recall. Thus rehearsal and cueing did not affect the schematization process whereby similar episodes of familiar events become confused in memory. The finding that rehearsal did not differentially affect children's recall at different ages suggests that older children's improved recall was not due to the use of rehearsal strategies; but the finding that younger children relied more heavily on recall cues than older children suggests that older children were more efficient at directing their own memory search.;The findings from this study of children's autobiographic memory which controlled for amount of experience with an event, amount of rehearsal, and effects of cueing, are consistent with the hypothesis that after experiencing a series of recurring episodes, preschool children formed a script for a novel event which guided their long-term recall of particular episodes.
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Type
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dissertation
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Source
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PQT Legacy CUNY.xlsx
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degree
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Ph.D.
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Program
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Psychology
