The Structure of Memory during Development

Episodic memory, or memory for specific past experiences, can be measured in ways ranging from fully controlled laboratory paradigms to real world settings. It is unknown whether different measures of episodic memory are capturing the same construct. We examined this question in children between four and seven years (N=76), using a battery of assessments ranging from measurements of memory for mini-events presented in the lab, to measures of memory for a cartoon, and most naturalistically, recall of real-world events, i.e., autobiographical memory. Most measures of memory improved with age. After controlling for the effects of age and verbal IQ, a factor analysis revealed two distinct components of children’s memory. The first component was comprised of our lab-based measures of memory and captured the majority of variance in the data. The second component included autobiographical memory and free recall of previously seen cartoons. This dichotomy may be driven by whether memory was assessed via recall or recognition. However, it also yields evidence for the idea that lab-based tasks and more naturalistic assessments of memory may not be measuring the same underlying construct.