WHAT CHILDRENS MEMORIES TELL US ABOUT RECALLING OUR CHILDHOODS - A REVIEW OF STORAGE AND RETRIEVAL-PROCESSES IN THE DEVELOPMENT OF LONG-TERM RETENTION

The trace integrity framework, including the associated mathematical m odel, is used to summarize a corpus of data on the development of chil dren's and adults' long-term retention. The purpose of this review is to get some leverage on what role storage and retrieval processes play in the forgetting and subsequent recovery of memory traces. What this review shows is that (1) forgetting is dominated by storage, not retr ieval, failures; (2) trace recovery is dominated by retrieval, not sto rage, operations; and (3) storage failure rates decline with age in ch ildhood, whereas only modest developments occur in retrieval recovery operations. These findings are then applied to current issues concerni ng adult recall of childhood memories. (C) 1997 Academic Press.