Reinstatement of Modeled Event Sequences: Linkages to Childrens Remembering Following a 6Month Delay

1
Reinstatement of Modeled Event Sequences
Linkages to Childrens Remembering Following a
6-Month Delay Priscilla San Souci¹, Laura E.
McCall¹, Peter A. Ornstein¹, and Catherine A.
Haden² The University of North Carolina at
Chapel Hill¹, Loyola University Chicago²
MEASURES
RESULTS
INTRODUCTION
MEASURES

• Reinstatement - the partial repetition of an
  early experience sufficient to prevent or
  minimize forgetting over a delay interval -
  functions as a mechanism that enables early
  experience to shape later behavior (Campbell
  Jaynes, 1966 Rovee-Collier, 1980).
• Studies of reinstatement in infant memory have
  indicated that the timing of a reminder is of
  critical importance (Galluccio Rovee-Collier,
  2006 Rovee-Collier, 1995).
• In studies of deferred imitation, it has been
  found that re-exposure to sequences after a short
  delay can facilitate long-term recall of
  individual actions of modeled sequences (Bauer,
  Wiebe, Waters, Bangston, 2001).
• This presentation focuses on elicited imitation
  performance at 36- and 42-months to address how
  an opportunity for some children to re-experience
  modeled event sequences following a delay
  interval affects long-term remembering.
• The participants represent a subsample of
  36-month-olds who were being followed in a
  longitudinal study of memory development.

Working Memory for Locations (Reznick, Corley,
Robinson, 1997)
Elicited Imitation (Bauer, Wenner,
Dropik, Wewerka, 2000) Four 9-step event
sequences were introduced to the children when
they were 36 months old. Two of the
sequences were arbitrarily ordered (no inherent
constraints on the temporal position of actions),
and two involved a mix of arbitrary and
enabling (each action had to be performed in a
temporally invariant order to reach the
end state) actions
Childrens Mean Production as a Function of
Reinstatement Group
Individual Target Actions (Maximum 9)

• In this task, a small toy was hidden under one
  cup in an array of 2, 4, or 6 inverted cups.
• The childs view was obstructed for 1, 5, 10,
  or 15 seconds, after which she was asked to
  uncover the hidden toy.
• This procedure was repeated over a series of
  trials of increasing difficulty, ending when a
  child committed two consecutive errors.
• The total numbers of correct reaches and errors
  committed were tallied for each child.

Playground (Arbitrary) Researcher modeled
playing in a sandbox, riding a bike, walking a
dog, playing ball, flying a kite, feeding a
goose, spinning a merry-go-round, pushing a
swing, and sliding down a slide.
Farm (Arbitrary) Researcher
modeled making a horse jump, putting a cow in the
barn, putting eggs in a basket, working in the
field, planting seeds, hooking up a tractor,
stacking hay, putting a carrot in a bin, and
chopping wood.
THE CHILDRENS MEMORY STUDY DEVELOPMENTAL
PATHWAYS TO SKILLED REMEMBERING
Action Pairs (Maximum 8)
A sample of 120 children and their families was
recruited from in and around Chapel Hill, NC and
Chicago, IL. Younger and older cohorts of
children were enrolled at 18 and 36 months of
age, respectively. This presentation focuses on
the older cohort of children who were assessed
until they reached 72 months of age. At each
time point, three home visits were conducted.
Mothers and children participated in a series of
tasks to evaluate the childrens mnemonic and
language skills, as well as dyadic communication
styles. A central goal of this longitudinal
project is to demonstrate how nonverbal memory
provides the foundation for deliberate
remembering.
Preschool Language Scale-3 (Zimmerman et al.,
1992)
House (Mixed) Researcher modeled putting in a
nail, pounding the nail, sanding the house,
putting up the chimney, hanging up the door,
painting the house, opening the roof, putting the
roof on top of the house, and sawing the house.
Circus (Mixed) Researcher modeled putting a ball
in a popper, popping the ball, shaking a maraca,
putting on a wheel, spinning the wheel, making a
clown car, making a hoop, jumping a tiger through
the hoop, and squeaking an elephant.
METHOD

• Participants
• 48 children from Chapel Hill, NC and Chicago,
  IL.
• Children were assessed at 36 months and again
  at 42 months
• The sample was nearly evenly divided between
  boys and girls, and the majority of the
  participants were Caucasian.
• Procedure
• A battery of deliberate memory, incidental
  memory, language, and ancillary measures was
  administered.
• An Elicited Imitation Task, a Working Memory
  for Locations task, and the Preschool Language
  Scale-III were selected to demonstrate how a
  single repetition of a modeled event sequence for
  some children at 36 months affected recall 6
  months later.

• On the elicited imitation task, the performance
  of the Reinstatement and Non-Reinstatement groups
  did not differ in terms of the production of
  individual actions and pairs of actions at the
  immediate and 3-week assessments (ps .15).
• Importantly, the groups did not differ in
  language skills at 36 months, as assessed with
  the PLS-3, t 1.35, p .19.
• Similarly, the performance of the two groups
  was comparable on the Working Memory and
  Locations task administered at 36 months, t
  -.45, p .65.
• However, the groups did differ at the 6 month
  assessment point, when the children were 42
  months of age. As can be seen, the children in
  the Reinstatement condition - who received a
  second modeling and opportunity to imitate the
  events at 36 months recalled an average 1.29
  more actions (p lt.01) and .58 more pairs (p lt
  .05) than the children in the Non-Reinstatement
  group.
• These preliminary findings support previous
  research noting the importance of reinstatement
  for the consolidation of memory representations
  and subsequent long term recall.

• The PLS-3, a standardized measure of receptive
  and expressive language, was also administered at
  36 and 42 months to determine the contributions
  of childrens verbal skills to memory performance.

• For each target action sequence, a baseline
  period in which children were allowed to freely
  manipulate the objects was followed by the
  researcher modeling the sequence of actions.
• Childrens imitation of the events immediately
  after modeling served as the basis for evaluating
  their immediate performance.
• Memory was also assessed at two delay
  intervals three weeks and six months.
• At the 3-week delay
• 31 of the children saw each event remodeled and
  received an additional opportunity to imitate the
  sequences (Reinstatement group)
• 17 children did not have this opportunity
  (Non-reinstatement group)
• Six months later, the children (age 42
  months) were again provided with the same four
  sets of props with no instruction or modeling,
  and their productions were used to index their
  long-term retention.

• At each of the recall intervals, two dependent
  variables were scored
• Total number of individual target actions
  produced (maximum 9)
• Total number of pairs of actions produced in
  the correct order (maximum8)

This material is based upon work supported by
grant HD 37114 from the National Institute of
Child Health and Human Development.