Childhood amnesia and early memories in children and adults

目标：这个研究项目的目标是了解儿童如何记住他们生活中的事件。在接下来的5年里，我们的目标是关注儿童健忘症，其定义是无法回忆起一个人的早年生活。这通常是通过让人们描述他们的第一次记忆来探索的。我们建议对儿童和成人的儿童健忘症进行研究。年龄比较使我们能够探索不同年龄和发展轨迹的差异。各种研究将探索：(A)最早记忆的可塑性。我们能通过实验干预来帮助孩子回忆起更早的记忆吗？(B)无论是儿童还是成人，我们怎样才能鼓励人们获得更早的第一次记忆和更多的早年记忆？(C)哪些变量影响对这些记忆进行年代测定的准确性，以及如何能够提高准确性？测年的准确性目前是一个重要的法医问题。(D)使用什么策略来找回一个人最早的记忆？目前，人们对此知之甚少。可以影响策略来提高约会的准确性吗？(E)对虐待或其他法医事件的早期记忆有多可信？其他人认为这样的记忆可信吗？这些都是警方和法院面临的重要法医问题。科学方法：所有研究都包括对个人的访谈。一些是一对一的面对面采访，另一些采访将通过Zoom等远程平台进行，还有一些将通过在线问卷进行。参加者将包括不同年龄段的儿童以及成年人。许多受访者的父母会核实他们孩子(包括成年子女)的记忆。新颖性/预期意义：拟议的一套研究探索儿童健忘症的新方面，并可为理解这一现象提供发展指导，因为儿童和成人都包括在内。“个人记忆何时开始”的问题一直是儿童健忘症文学中经常被问到的问题，对这个问题的回答影响了早期记忆理论的构建。大多数研究人员和几乎所有相关教科书都声称，最早记忆的平均年龄约为3.5年，但我实验室最近的研究让人对此产生了相当大的怀疑。相反，我们认为记忆比人们通常认为的更早、更多，而且记忆的获得是由各种因素决定的。这项拟议的研究具有重要的法医学意义。儿童和成年人在事件发生多年后站出来声称受到虐待并不少见。警方和法院面临的重要问题围绕着这种记忆是可信的还是虚构的。如果能够证明许多人确实能够准确地回忆起2岁起的事件，而且更好的采访技巧可以帮助人们获得这些非常早期的记忆，这就让人们对从2岁开始记住的事件往往被完全忽视产生了怀疑

Objectives: The goal of this research program is to understand how children remember the events of their lives. For the next 5 years our objectives focus on childhood amnesia, defined as the inability to recall one's early life. It is commonly explored by asking people to describe their first memory. We propose to study childhood amnesia in both children and adults. Age comparisons allow us to explore differences across age as well as developmental trajectories. Various studies will explore: (a) The malleability of earliest memory. Can we experimentally intervene to help children recall even earlier memories? (b) How can we encourage access to both earlier first memories and more numerous memories from one's very early years, in both children and adults? (c) What variables affect accuracy of dating those memories and how might one be able to improve accuracy? Dating accuracy is currently an important forensic issue. (d) What strategies are used to retrieve one's earliest memories? Little is currently known about this. Can strategies be influenced to improve dating accuracy? (e) How credible are early memories of abuse or other forensic events? And are such memories perceived as credible by others? These are important forensic issues faced by police and courts. Scientific Approach: All studies involve interviews of individuals. Some are one-on-one in-person interviews, other interviews will be conducted via remote platforms like zoom, and others through on-line questionnaires. Participants will include children of various ages as well as adults. Parents of many interviewees will verify their children's (including adult offspring) memories. Novelty/Expected Significance: The proposed set of studies explores novel aspects of childhood amnesia and can provide developmental guidance in understanding the phenomenon because of the inclusion of both children and adults. The question of "when do personal memories start" has been an often-asked question in the childhood amnesia literature, and answers to this question have influenced theory construction about early memory. Most researchers and virtually all relevant textbooks claim that the average age of earliest memory is about 3½ years, but recent work in my lab has cast considerable doubt on this. Rather, we think that memories are earlier and more numerous than commonly believed, and that accessing them is shaped by various factors. The proposed research has important forensic implications. It is not unusual for children and adults to come forward many years after an event with assertions of experiencing abuse. Important questions facing police and courts revolve around whether such memories are credible or fictional. If it can be shown that many people are indeed able to accurately recall events from age 2, and that better interviewing techniques can help people access these very early memories, this casts doubt on the often wholesale dismissal of remembered events that date from this early