PSY101
Unforgotten Children (PAPER #2)

Do children generally have better memory than adults? The answer is yes and no. Children can have better memory than adults (sometimes). According to Vladimir Sloutsky, a professor and director for the Center of Cognitive Science at Ohio State University, says “Believe it or not, a 5-year-old could beat most adults on a recognition memory test, at least under specific conditions.” Even though memory develops from early childhood to young adulthood getting better as time goes by in one of Vladimir’s studies children were accurate 31 percent of the time in identifying pictures of animal they had been shown earlier, while adults were accurate only 7 percent of the time. It may seem a little odd when young adults supposedly have a better memory than children but it makes perfect sense. The memory disparity between the two groups was not because the young adults had a lot on their mind at that time or were worrying too much about something. “The accuracy of the adults memory test was hurt simply by the fact that they know more than the children and tend to apply this knowledge when learning new information.” This is a type of inference. There are two types of inferences in psychology and one is retroactive inference and the other is called proactive inference. The one the adults experienced was retroactive inference, which is the disruptive effect of learning new knowledge while recalling prerequisite information. “Which is rather like a second stone tossed in a pond, disrupting the waves rippling out from the first.” Proactive is just the opposite. In one case, researchers showed 77 young children (about 5) and 77 college students thirty pictures of cats, dogs, bears and birds. The first picture presented to the test subjects was an image of a cat with “beta cells inside its body” everyone was then shown pictures, one at a time, and were asked whether each of the animals also had beta cells. After that part of the study was finished, the participants were shown 28 pictures and asked whether each was old or new. None of the participants knew they were going to be tested on their memory. This was the study where children scored with 31 percent accuracy versus the adults whom only scored a measly 7 percent. Retroactive Inference does play a big part in the adults’ low score however the reason why children were also able to retain so much was due to the method of induction. Induction is when a person uses particular facts to reach general principles. For example. All crows are black. The