title: Magic memories: young children's verbal recall after a 6-year delay.
abstract: This report describes the first prospective study specifically designed to assess children's verbal memory for a unique event 6 years after it occurred. Forty-six 27- to 51-month-old children took part in a unique event and were interviewed about it twice, after 24-hr and 6-year delays. During the 6-year interview, 9 children verbally recalled the event, including 2 who were under 3 years old when the event occurred. This may be the most convincing evidence to date that such early experiences can be verbally recalled after long delays. These data have important implications for current theories of memory development and childhood amnesia and underscore some of the problems associated with evaluating the veracity of early memories under less controlled conditions.
authors.affiliation: University of Otago, Dunedin, New Zealand.
authors.forename: Fiona
authors.initials: F
authors.lastname: Jack
authors.forename: Gabrielle
authors.initials: G
authors.lastname: Simcock
authors.forename: Harlene
authors.initials: H
authors.lastname: Hayne
mesh_terms: D002648:Child; D002657:Child Development; D002675:Child, Preschool; D005260:Female; D006801:Humans; D007406:Interview, Psychological; D008016:Life Change Events; D008273:Magic; D008297:Male; D061212:Memory, Episodic; D011446:Prospective Studies; D012153:Retention, Psychology; D014705:Verbal Behavior