Much of what is known about the influence of postevent misinformation on children's event reports is based on studies in which children were exposed to the target event once. Nelson and her colleagues (e.g., 1986) have reported a considerable array of data that demonstrates that children's reports of a routine, or of an instance of a routine, is quite different from their reports of a unique event. Based on this literature on children's script memory it seemed reasonable to speculate that prior similar experiences with the target event would mitigate and/or heighten the influence of suggestions on children's reports of an instance of a routine.
In Experiment 1, 4-, 6-, and 8-year-olds participated in one or four play sessions. Children in the 4-sessions condition (4-S) participated in play sessions on four consecutive days. During each session some target details remained the same (fixed) and some changed (variable). The single play session in the 1-session condition (1-S) was identical to the last play session in the 4-S condition.
Three days later children were asked to think about the last play session and to answer related questions. Embedded in some of the questions were suggestions that things had happened during the final play session that had not occurred during any of the play sessions. Some of the suggestions related to fixed event details and some related to variable event details. Other questions presented neutral information about target details and served as control items. One day later, children were asked to think back to the final play session and to answer questions based on memory for it. Children were asked for free and cued recall and then to answer a set of “yes/no” recognition questions. Correct and incorrect responses were analyzed. Experiment 2 was similar to the 4-S condition of Experiment 1. Only 8-year-olds were tested and some different materials were used during the play sessions.
In Experiment 1, the proportion of incorrect responses was higher for preschoolers than for older children, but age did not enter into any important interactions. Responses to questions about fixed items were more often correct and less often incorrect among children in the 4-S condition than among children in the 1-S condition. Responses to questions about variable suggested items were more often incorrect among children in the 4-S condition than among children in the 1-S condition. There was no effect of sessions on correct responses to questions about variable control items. In Experiment 2, children's responses to questions about variable details were substantially more often incorrect when the items were suggested than when they were control. There was not a reliable suggested/control difference in responses to questions about fixed details.
Children's script memory is used to interpret these data. Scripts are hypothesized to be abstract cognitive representations of what usually happens during an instance of a routine. Fixed details of a routine are proposed to be represented as part of the script. Memory for them is strong and, in the present study, children successfully resisted related suggestions. Memory for variable components of a routine is hypothesized to be a list-like set of experienced options that may be only loosely associated with particular instances. Children had difficulty resisting suggestions related to variable details of the routine. / Graduate
| Identifer | oai:union.ndltd.org:uvic.ca/oai:dspace.library.uvic.ca:1828/9811 |
| Date | 01 August 2018 |
| Creators | Connolly, Deborah Ann |
| Contributors | Lindsay, D.S. |
| Source Sets | University of Victoria |
| Language | English, English |
| Detected Language | English |
| Type | Thesis |
| Format | application/pdf |
| Rights | Available to the World Wide Web |
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