Children's Earliest Memories: Could Spontaneous Retrieval be a Shortcut?

• In Event: 1-164 - Your First Memory may be Earlier than we Thought: Evidence from Retrieval and Cohort Effects

Integrative Statement

When examining earliest memories, the predominant method has been to simply ask respondents about their memories (Hayne et al., 2015). To comply with this standard methodology, the subjects — being children or adults — have to engage in deliberate, strategic recall, which involves the prefrontal cortex. Moreover, the prefrontal cortex matures late in the ontogenesis (e.g., Johnson, 2005), making the task of strategic recall especially difficult for young children.

Strategic retrieval is, however, not the only route to event memories. At times event memories come to our mind “uninvited”, almost “out of the blue”. Such memories are labelled spontaneous memories (Krøjgaard et al., 2014). Because spontaneous recall is driven mainly by associative mechanisms, and therefore less dependent on prefrontal cortex (Hall et al., 2014), it may constitute an easier path to memories. However, very few studies have examined spontaneous recall in children, and almost all of these are diary studies.

We present three studies in which we induced spontaneous recall with 35- and 46-month-old children in a controlled lab setting (2017 [N = 110]; in press [N = 80]; in prep. [N = 124]). All studies were based on the same basic experimental design in which the children visited the lab twice with a one-week retention interval (see Fig. 1). Parents had been instructed not to initiate conversation or use prompts. At T1, half of the children experienced a Teddy Event whereas the other half witnessed a Game Event. When returning to lab (T2), the children’s spontaneous verbal utterances were recorded and compared to baseline (T1). Blinded coders scored the children’s utterances.

The 2017 investigation revealed that at the test (T2), the children talked spontaneously about the event experienced at T1. Whereas age had no systematic effect on spontaneous recall, it did have an effect on subsequent control questions requiring strategic retrieval, implying that spontaneous recall is an easier path to memories than strategic recall. However, the study could not specify the environmental cues that had initiated the spontaneous recall (the context? the experimenter?, or..?).

In the second study (in press), we therefore manipulated the context for retrieval. Using the same design, half of the eighty 35-month-old children returned to the same lab room, whereas the other half returned to a different room (see Fig. 2). The results revealed that despite returning to a different room, the children still spontaneously recalled the event.

In the third study (in prep.), we examined whether changing the Experimenter when returning for the test would affect spontaneous recall in 35- and 46-month-olds. The results revealed a surprising interaction: Whereas changing the Experimenter decreased the 35-month-old children’s tendency to spontaneously recall the event, it actually increased spontaneous recall for the older peers.

The obtained results support Berntsen’s (2012) claim that being a basic mechanism, spontaneous retrieval may be especially prevalent in young children. Therefore, we may have underestimated the amount of memories that young children have, which may have consequences for our understanding of our earliest memories and their fate.

Authors

• Peter Krøjgaard, Aarhus University
  Presenting Author

• Trine Sonne, Aarhus University
  Non-Presenting Author

• Osman Skjold Kingo, Aarhus University
  Non-Presenting Author

• Dorthe Berntsen, Aarhus University
  Non-Presenting Author