Axelsson Emma L, Dawson Rachelle L, Yim Sharon Y, Quddus Tashfia
Research School of Psychology, ANU College of Health & Medicine, Australian National University, Canberra, ACT, Australia.
Department of Psychology, Uppsala University, Uppsala, Sweden.
Front Psychol. 2018 Jun 12;9:958. doi: 10.3389/fpsyg.2018.00958. eCollection 2018.
Adults demonstrate enhanced memory for words encoded as belonging to themselves compared to those belonging to another. Known as the self-reference effect, there is evidence for the effect in children as young as three. Toddlers are efficient in linking novel words to novel objects, but have difficulties retaining multiple word-object associations. The aim here was to investigate the self-reference ownership paradigm on 3-year-old children's retention of novel words. Following exposure to each of four novel word-object pairings, children were told that objects either belonged to them or another character. Children demonstrated significantly higher immediate retention of self-referenced compared to other-referenced items. Retention was also tested 4 h later and the following morning. Retention for self- and other-referenced words was significantly higher than chance at both delayed time points, but the difference between the self- and other-referenced words was no longer significant. The findings suggest that when it comes to toddlers' retention of multiple novel words there is an initial memory enhancing effect for self- compared to other-referenced items, but the difference diminishes over time. Children's looking times during the self-reference presentations were positively associated with retention of self-referenced words 4 h later. Looking times during the other-reference presentations were positively associated with proportional looking at other-referenced items during immediate retention testing. The findings have implications for children's memory for novel words and future studies could test children's explicit memories for the ownership manipulation itself and whether the effect is superior to other forms of memory supports such as ostensive naming.
与属于他人的单词相比，成年人对编码为属于自己的单词表现出更强的记忆力。这种现象被称为自我参照效应，有证据表明三岁的儿童也存在这种效应。幼儿能够有效地将新单词与新物体联系起来，但在保留多个单词-物体关联方面存在困难。本研究的目的是调查自我参照所有权范式对三岁儿童新单词记忆的影响。在接触了四组新的单词-物体配对后，孩子们被告知物体要么属于他们自己，要么属于另一个角色。与其他参照的物品相比，孩子们对自我参照的物品表现出明显更高的即时记忆力。4小时后和第二天早上也进行了记忆力测试。在两个延迟时间点，自我参照和其他参照单词的记忆力都显著高于随机水平，但自我参照和其他参照单词之间的差异不再显著。研究结果表明，在幼儿对多个新单词的记忆方面，与其他参照的物品相比，自我参照的物品最初具有记忆增强作用，但随着时间的推移，这种差异会逐渐减小。自我参照展示过程中孩子们的注视时间与4小时后自我参照单词的记忆呈正相关。其他参照展示过程中的注视时间与即时记忆测试中对其他参照物品的比例注视呈正相关。这些发现对儿童新单词记忆具有启示意义，未来的研究可以测试儿童对所有权操纵本身的明确记忆，以及这种效应是否优于其他形式的记忆支持，如明示命名。
