Knowledge of memory functions in European and Asian American adults and children: The relation to autobiographical memory

Abstract

This study investigated explicit knowledge of autobiographical memory functions using a newly developed questionnaire. European and Asian American adults (N = 57) and school-aged children (N = 68) indicated their agreement with 13 statements about why people think about and share memories pertaining to four broad functions—self, social, directive and emotion regulation. Children were interviewed for personal memories concurrently with the memory function knowledge assessment and again 3 months later. It was found that adults agreed to the self, social and directive purposes of memory to a greater extent than did children, whereas European American children agreed to the emotion regulation purposes of memory to a greater extent than did European American adults. Furthermore, European American children endorsed more self and emotion regulation functions than did Asian American children, whereas Asian American adults endorsed more directive functions than did European American adults. Children's endorsement of memory functions, particularly social functions, was associated with more detailed and personally meaningful memories. These findings are informative for the understanding of developmental and cultural influences on memory function knowledge and of the relation of such knowledge to autobiographical memory development.

Keywords:

• Memory function
• Culture
• Autobiographical memory
• Metamemory
• Knowledge of memory functions
• Meta-autobiographical memory

We thank members of the Social Cognition Development Lab at Cornell University for their assistance. Special thanks go to the participants who made the study possible.

This research was supported by the National Science Foundation [grant number BCS-0721171] and a Hatch Grant from the US Department of Agriculture to the first author.

We thank members of the Social Cognition Development Lab at Cornell University for their assistance. Special thanks go to the participants who made the study possible.

This research was supported by the National Science Foundation [grant number BCS-0721171] and a Hatch Grant from the US Department of Agriculture to the first author.

Notes

¹ Participants performed additional tasks that address separate research questions. The data are not included here.

² Children were interviewed for memory first, and then for knowledge of memory functions, with a number of unrelated tasks in-between.

³ The pattern of relations between memory function knowledge and memory variables was generally consistent across the four memory events. We therefore reported results based on the means of the events.