Lifespan Development. Tara L. Kuther

in a culture of verse and rely on oral transmission of information, likely underlying their skill relative to adults.

      Memory for Scripts

      Young children remember familiar repeated everyday experiences, like the process of eating dinner, taking a bath, or going to nursery school or preschool, as scripts, or descriptions of what occurs in a particular situation. When young children begin to use scripts, they remember only the main details. A 3-year-old might describe a trip to a restaurant as follows: “You go in, eat, then pay.” These early scripts include only a few acts but usually are recalled in the correct order (Bauer, 1996). As children grow older and gain cognitive competence, scripts become more elaborate. Consider a 5-year-old child’s explanation of a trip to a restaurant: “You go in, you can sit at a booth or a table, then you tell the waitress what you want, you eat, if you want dessert, you can have some, then you go pay, and go home” (Hudson, Fivush, & Kuebli, 1992). Scripts are an organizational tool that help children understand and remember repeated events and help them to predict future events. However, scripts may inhibit memory for new details. For example, in one laboratory study, children were presented with a script of the same series of events repeated in order multiple times as well as a single alternative event. Preschoolers were less likely than older children to spontaneously recall and provide a detailed account of the event (Brubacher, Glisic, Roberts, & Powell, 2011).

      This child demonstrates a script as she explains the process of going to a restaurant and ordering from a menu.

      Inti St Clair/Blend/Newscom

      Autobiographical Memory

      Autobiographical memory refers to memory of personally meaningful events that took place at a specific time and place in one’s past (Bauer, 2015). Autobiographical memory emerges as children become proficient in language and executive function and develops steadily from 3 to 6 years of age (Nieto, Ros, Ricarte, & Latorre, 2018). Young children report fewer memories for specific events than do older children and adults (Baker-Ward, Gordon, Ornstein, Larus, & Clubb, 1993). But by age 3, they are able to retrieve and report specific memories, especially those that have personal significance, are repeated, or are highly stressful (Nuttall, Valentino, Comas, McNeill, & Stey, 2014). For example, in one study, children who were at least 26 months old at the time of an accidental injury and visit to the emergency room accurately recalled the details of these experiences even after a 2-year delay (Goodman, Rudy, Bottoms, & Aman, 1990). Eight-year-old children have been found to accurately remember events that occurred when they were as young as 3½ years of age (Goodman & Aman, 1990).

      Events that are unique or new, such as a trip to the circus, are better recalled; 3-year-old children will recall them for a year or longer (Fivush, Hudson, & Nelson, 1983). Frequent events, however, tend to blur together. Young children are better at remembering things they did than things they simply watched. For example, one study examined 5-year-old children‘s recall of an event they observed, were told about, or experienced. A few days later, the children who actually experienced the event were more likely to recall details in a more accurate and organized way and to require fewer prompts (Murachver, Pipe, Gordon, Owens, & Fivush, 1996).

      The way adults talk with the child about a shared experience can influence how well the child will remember it (Haden & Fivush, 1996). Parents with an elaborative conversational style discuss new aspects of an experience, provide more information to guide a child through a mutually rewarding conversation, and affirm the child’s responses. They may ask questions, expand children’s responses, and help the child tell their story. Three-year-olds of parents who use an elaborative style engage in longer conversations about events, remember more details, and tend to remember the events better at ages 5 and 6 (Fivush, 2011).

      Applying Developmental Science

      Children’s Suggestibility

      Repeated questioning about an event that may or may not have happened may increase suggestibility in children.

      Gordon Scammell / Alamy Stock Photo

      The accuracy of children’s memory, especially their vulnerability to suggestion, is an important topic because children as young as 3 years have been called upon to relate their memories of events that they have experienced or witnessed, including abuse, maltreatment, and domestic violence (Pantell & Committee on Psychosocial Aspects of Child and Family Health, 2017). Young children can recall much about their experiences, often material that is relevant and accurate (Cauffman, Shulman, Bechtold, & Steinberg, 2015). How suggestible are young children? Can we trust their memories?

      Research suggests that repeated questioning may increase suggestibility in children (La Rooy, Lamb, & Pipe, 2011). For example, in one study, preschoolers were questioned every week about events that had either happened or not happened to them; by the 11th week, nearly two thirds of the children falsely reported having experienced an event (Ceci, Huffman, Smith, & Loftus, 1994). Preschool-age children may be more vulnerable to suggestion than school-age children or adults (Brown & Lamb, 2015). When children were asked if they could remember several events, including a fictitious instance of getting their finger caught in a mousetrap, almost none of them initially recalled these events. However, after repeated suggestive questioning, more than half of 3- and 4-year-olds and two fifths of 5- and 6-year-olds said they recalled these events—often vividly (Poole & White, 1991, 1993).

      Young children’s natural trust in others may enhance their suggestibility. In one study, 3-year-olds who received misleading verbal and visual information from an experimenter about a sticker’s location continued to search in the wrong, suggested location despite no success (Jaswal, 2010). In another study, 3- to 5-year-old children watched as an adult hid a toy in one location, then told the children that the toy was in a different location. When retrieving the toy, 4- and 5-year-olds relied on what they had seen and disregarded the adult’s false statements, but 3-year-olds deferred to what the adult had said, despite what they had directly observed (Ma & Ganea, 2010).

      In some cases, children can resist suggestion. For example, in one study, 4- and 7-year-old children either played games with an adult confederate (e.g., dressing up in costumes, playing tickle, being photographed) or merely watched the games (Ceci & Bruck, 1998). Eleven days later, each child was interviewed by an adult who included misleading questions that were often followed up with suggestions relevant to child abuse. Even the 4-year-olds resisted the false suggestions about child abuse. Children also vary. Some children are better able to resist social pressure and suggestive questioning than others (Uhl, Camilletti, Scullin, & Wood, 2016).

      Children are more vulnerable than adults, but adults are not entirely resistant to suggestion. For example, recent research suggests that in some situations, adults are more likely than children to make quick associations between suggestive details about unexperienced events and prior experiences, making them more vulnerable to suggestion (Otgaar, Howe, Merckelbach, & Muris, 2018). Like children, adults who are exposed to information that is misleading or inconsistent with their experiences are more likely to perform poorly during memory interviews—and repeated questioning has a similar effect on performance (Wysman, Scoboria, Gawrylowicz, & Memon, 2014).

      What Do You Think?

      Suppose you need to question a preschool child about an event. How would you maximize your likelihood of the child’s giving an accurate account of what occurred?

      Young children can have largely accurate memories, but they can also tell tall tales, make errors, and succumb to misleading questions. Children’s ability to remember events can be influenced by information