Narrative organisation at encoding facilitated children's long-term episodic memory.
This study examined the effect of narrative organisation at encoding on long-term episodic memory in a sample of five- to seven-year-old children (N = 113). At an initial interview, children were asked to narrate a story from a picture book. Six months later, they were interviewed again and asked to recall the story and answer a series of direct questions about the story. Children who initially encoded more information in narrative and produced more complete, complex, cohesive and coherent narratives remembered the story in greater detail and accuracy following the six-month interval, independent of age and verbal skills. The relation between narrative organisation and memory was consistent across culture and gender. These findings provide new insight into the critical role of narrative in episodic memory.
a Department of Human Development , Cornell University , Ithaca , NY , USA.
Qi
Q
Wang
Van-Kim
VK
Bui
Qingfang
Q
Song
D044466:Asian People / Q000523:psychology; D002648:Child; D002675:Child, Preschool; D005260:Female; D006801:Humans; D008297:Male; D061212:Memory, Episodic; D057567:Memory, Long-Term; D011939:Mental Recall; D033262:Narration; D044465:White People / Q000523:psychology
Encoding; Episodic memory; Memory accuracy; Narrative organisation