Event-Based Prospective Memory and Verbatim–Gist Recall in A6utism Spectrum Disorder

This study examines the effects of cueing conditions (full cue vs. no cue) on event-based prospective memory (PM) performance in individuals with Autism Spectrum Disorder (ASD). It specifically investigates how individuals with ASD encode and retrieve event-based intentions and whether their reliance on verbatim memory affects PM execution. Addressing inconsistent findings in previous research, the study explores whether external cueing can improve PM performance by compensating for spontaneous retrieval difficulties and reduced gist-based processing. A total of 102 participants took part in the study, including 50 high-functioning ASD individuals (M = 20.71, SD = 2.70) and 52 typically developing controls (M = 21.75, SD = 1.97). Participants performed a multi-trial, multi-list event-based PM task under full cue and no cue conditions. They were required to detect pre-specified PM targets while recalling studied items, allowing assessment of PM accuracy and cue-based facilitation. Results showed that ASD participants had significantly lower PM performance in the no-cue condition, indicating difficulty in spontaneous intention retrieval. Full cue conditions enhanced PM performance but did not fully mitigate challenges. Findings support Fuzzy Trace Theory, suggesting that ASD individuals rely heavily on verbatim memory and benefit from structured, salient cues that support retrieval when gist processing is limited.