THE EFFECT OF DRAWING ON MEMORY PERFORMANCE IN YOUNG-CHILDREN

In Experiment 1, 32 5- to 6-year-old boys and girls participated in a unique event and were interviewed about that event 1 day later. Half o f the children were asked to draw what happened during the event and h alf were asked to tell what happened. In both conditions, only childre n's verbal behavior was scored. Children in the draw group were as acc urate and reported more information than children in the tell group, e specially in response to direct questions. In Experiment 2, 32 5- to 6 -years-olds and 32 3- to 4-year-olds participated in the same event us ed in Experiment 1 and were interviewed 1 month later. The 5- to 6-yea r-olds in the draw group reported more information than the 5- to 6-ye ar-olds in the tell group after the 1-month delay. Drawing did not, ho wever, increase the amount of information reported by 3- to 4-year-old s. These findings have important theoretical implications for memory d evelopment and important practical implications for children's eyewitn ess testimony.