3-YEAR-OLDS REMEMBER A NOVEL EVENT FROM 20 MONTHS - EVIDENCE FOR LONG-TERM-MEMORY IN CHILDREN

Thirty-seven 3-year-old children, who had learned a 9-action event seq uence (''making Play-Doh spaghetti'') when they were 20 months old, re turned to the lab to determine whether they would be able to verbally and/or behaviourally recall the event after a 12- to 22-month delay. C hildren originally participated in the event either one or three times and experienced different parts of the event either at three distinct locations (spatial condition) or at a single location (nonspatial con dition). Results show very little evidence of long-term memory for the event after one to two years. Returning children did not verbally rec all the event, and they did not perform more actions or sequence the e vent more accurately than controls, with the exception of the older ex perimental children who had a tendency to sequence the event more accu rately than same-aged controls. Although the results indicate that you ng children's memory for novel events is not very enduring, there were individual differences in children's ability to remember the event. T hese differences are discussed in terms of potential differences in co gnitive abilities and changing knowledge about retrieval strategies or memory.