The Effects of Age on the Application of Memory Strategies Essay Example

purpose of enhancing memory recall. As children grow older, their natural inclination to rehearse will become more apparent. Previous studies conducted by Kail (1990) and Moely (cited in Kail 1990) have shown that children under seven years old have not yet acquired the skill of rehearsal. Kail (1990) references a study by Moely, Olson, Halwes, and Flavell (1969) (cited in Kail, 1990) which involved presenting a group of children aged between five and 11 with a variety of pictures. These pictures were arranged in a circular formation without any organized order, meaning that no two pictures from the same category were placed next to each other. The children were instructed to study the pictures and were allowed to rearrange them if it helped them remember. The researchers were particularly interested in observing the associations the children made between pictures of the same categories.

The researchers developed a scale to measure the participants' number of associations. A score of 0 meant no associations were made, while a score of 1 indicated perfect organization, with the participant correctly recognizing and associating all the categories and items. The study found that only children aged 10-11 demonstrated a proficient ability to categorize pictures to aid in memory. Younger children rarely displayed this ability.

This study demonstrates the significant changes observed in a child's memory between the ages of 5 and 11. During this period, children develop the ability to categorize information for future retrieval (Kail, 1990). It has been found that memory strategies play a crucial role in enhancing memory storage, after extensive research (Flavell and Wellman, 1977, cited in Kail, 1990). Four common memory strategies for encoding information are Attention,

Rehearsal, Organization, and Elaboration. Attention involves focusing specifically on the items to be remembered. Rehearsal entails repetitive repetition of the items. Organization involves structuring information in a manner that facilitates easy remembrance. In the case of this experiment, pictures were placed in corresponding categories as a form of organization.

Finally, the act of elaboration involves linking the items to be remembered to other information in order to enhance memory recall, such as creating a story. Utilizing one of these techniques is highly likely to improve the ability to remember the given items. The focal question in this experiment is whether younger individuals will employ these strategies for encoding information. As we age, our wealth of knowledge expands, increasing the necessity to efficiently store and retrieve information stored in our memory. Three common strategies for memory retrieval are the utilization of cues, associations, and persistence. By recalling a cue, it can trigger the remembrance of other associated items.

Remembering the lamp can jog the memory of the chair, couch, bed, and table that are associated with it. Associations help in remembering items by linking them to something related, such as recalling getting dressed in the morning to remember the different clothing items shown in pictures. Additionally, persistence at a task can jog one's memory. Children tend to view visual cues as isolated objects with no connections to other items, while older children and adults use cues as starting points for extensive memory searches (Kail, 1990). Understanding developmental stages in memory learning strategies helps in comprehending how to teach memory strategies to young children and how to maximize our memory capacity in daily life. This experiment aims to investigate

if presenting pictures in an organized manner has a stronger impact on younger participants and if there are variations among young and older participants in terms of organizing unorganized pictures. The hypothesis is that young participants will recall a higher number of items from organized pictures compared to unorganized ones.

The experiment aimed to evaluate the recall accuracy and use of organizational strategies during retrieval in both mature and young participants. The findings revealed that the mature participants displayed minimal differences in recall accuracy between organized and unorganized conditions. Additionally, they exhibited the utilization of an organizational strategy during retrieval for unorganized pictures. Conversely, young participants did not employ this strategy. In total, 749 individuals participated in the experiment, comprising 85 participants aged 0-7 years old and 664 participants aged 11 years old or older. The average age within the young group was recorded as 5.4 years. Participants were selected semi-randomly from first-year undergraduate students enrolled in Psychology 112 at the University of Otago, along with their acquaintances. For those enrolled in the Psychology course, participation was mandatory; however, outsiders and younger children provided voluntary consent to participate. Data collection spanned four years duration-wise. Before commencing the experiment, each participant had to sign a Declaration of Informed Consent to confirm their comprehension of the experiment's purpose and objectives, as well as their willingness to partake. The experiment featured two sets of pictures accompanied by a distraction illustration.

Each set of pictures had 20 individual pictures, with five pictures from "Sea Animals," "Food," "Christmas themes," "Halloween," "Insects," "Zoo Animals," and similar categories. One set, labeled 'O,' was organized so that the participant saw the five pictures from each

category in consecutive order. The second set, labeled 'U,' was unorganized, meaning that no two pictures from the same category appeared consecutively to the participant.

The participant referred to the organized and unorganized sets of pictures as Set A and Set B. A stopwatch was used to measure the time between segments of the experiment. The results were recorded on a coding sheet and then loaded into the Psychology computers for calculation of the mean recall figures. The experimental design incorporated both within subjects and between subjects elements.

The experiment involved both within-subjects and between-subjects designs. All participants experienced the same testing procedure, making it a within-subjects design. However, there were two different experimental categories (young age group and mature age group), making it a between-subjects design. Two variables were manipulated: participant age (young or mature) and data presentation format (organized or unorganized). The measured variables were the number of items recalled from the organized and unorganized picture presentations, as well as the number of paired associations made. The experiment was conducted by pair groups of Psychology 112 students on each other. To counterbalance the conditions, each group was assigned a number indicating whether the organized or unorganized data would be presented first or second.

The participant's ability to practice the information was impeded. To control for potential bias, a different method of counterbalancing was employed. This involved randomly assigning either stimulus set A or B for organization purposes. By doing this, it guaranteed that one set would not be easier to organize or associate with than the other. Moreover, the experiment introduced further variation by alternating which stimulus set would be presented first. Initially, all pictures were

shown to the participant to ensure identification. Afterward, the following instruction was given: "Now I am going to place all of the pictures on the table."

The Psychology Laboratory Manual in 2003 described a study where participants were given two minutes to study a set of 20 pictures. During this time, they were allowed to rearrange or handle the pictures in any way that would help them learn. Once the two minutes were up, the pictures were taken away and participants were asked to recall as many as they could remember. The order in which they saw the pictures initially did not matter. After this, participants had 30 seconds of distraction before being asked to recall the original set of 20 pictures again.

In addition, participants were given another set of pictures and instructed to follow the same procedure: spend two minutes observing the pictures and then dedicate 30 seconds explaining the distraction task before attempting to recollect as many as possible from memory. Whether an organized or unorganized set was presented first depended on this second round.

The results were recorded on the Coding Sheet and the number of category pairs recalled for both the organised and unorganised data was calculated by the experimenter.