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Directed forgetting in young children: Evidence for a production deficiency

  • When people are cued to forget a previously studied list of items and to learn a new list instead, such cuing typically leads to forgetting of the first list and to memory enhancement of the second. In two experiments, we examined such listwise directed forgetting in children (and adults), using a forget cue that placed either high emphasis or low emphasis on the need to forget. In the low-emphasis condition, (adult-like) List 1 forgetting was present in fourth graders, but not in first graders (and kindergartners); in contrast, in the high-emphasis condition, (adult-like) List 1 forgetting was present from first grade on. Only fourth graders showed (adult-like) List 2 enhancement, regardless of task instruction. The finding that first graders showed List 1 forgetting only in the high-emphasis condition points to a production deficiency in first graders’ directed forgetting, suggesting that the children are capable of intentional forgetting but fail to do so spontaneously. The finding that first graders showed List 1 forgetting without List 2 enhancement suggests that the two directed-forgetting effects are mediated by different processes with different developmental trajectories.

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Metadaten
Author:Alp AslanORCiD, Tobias Staudigl, Anuscheh Samenieh, Karl-Heinz T. Bäuml
URL:https://doi.org/10.3758/PBR.17.6.784
Parent Title (English):Psychonomic Bulletin & Review
Document Type:Article (peer reviewed)
Language:English
Publication Year:2010
Tag:Fourth Grader; High Emphasis; Production Deficiency; Retrieval Inhibition; Task Instruction
Volume:17
Issue:6
First Page:784
Last Page:789
Peer reviewed:Ja