Journal of Experimental Psychology

Childhood Amnesia and the Beginnings of Memory for Four Early Life Events

JoNell Adair Usher and Ulric Neisser

Childhood amnesia was examined in a between-groups study of adults’ memories of 4 datable target events—the birth of a younger sibling, a hospitalization, the death of a family member, and making a family move. College students (N = 222) answered questions about events that had occurred when they were 1,2,3,4, or 5 years old and also about external information sources, such as family stories. Results show that the offset of childhood amnesia (earliest age of recall) is age 2 for hospitalization and sibling birth and 3 for death and move. Thus, some memories are available from earlier in childhood than previous research has suggested. Subjects’ mothers judged most of their children’s memories as accurate. External information sources were negatively related to recall from the earlier ages (2-3) but positively to recall from later ages (4-5). These results are compatible with a multiple-determinants account of childhood amnesia.

The life history of any adult begins with a period from which no events are remembered. Although this “childhood amnesia” has been much discussed since Freud (1916/1963) first called attention to it, there have been few empirical studies of the phenomenon itself. By definition it begins at birth, but when does it end? Most estimates of the offset of childhood amnesia stem from studies in which adults are asked to report and to date their “earliest memories” (e.g., Dudycha & Dudycha, 1941; Kihlstrom & Harackiewicz, 1982; Waldvogel, 1948). This method produces average ear- liest memories from around age 3 1/2. In a related method, subjects get cue words and are asked to date whatever rec- ollections the cues bring to mind (Crovitz & Shiffman, 1974; Rubin, Wetzler, & Nebes, 1986). Analysis of the frequencies with which different portions of the life span are represented in these recalls produces a “forgetting function,” in which childhood amnesia appears as a steep drop for the first few years of life.

These methods seem problematic to us. The dates assigned to such memories are not easily verified, and the role of external information sources (e.g., frequently told family sto- ries) has rarely been assessed. Moreover, neither the recalled events themselves nor the unrecalled ones that have appar- ently succumbed to childhood amnesia are controlled; both vary haphazardly from one subject to another. The present study is based on a different method that we call targeted recall. We first located subjects who had undergone a target

JoNell Adair Usher and Ulric Neisser, Department of Psychol- ogy, Emory University.

This article is based in part on a doctoral dissertation by JoNell Adair Usher. We thank Jonathan Schooler, Michael J. A. Howe, and a third (anonymous) referee of the first draft of this article. Their suggestions led to substantial improvements in our database and analyses. Thanks also to Mitchell Prinstein for assistance in data collection and various aspects of this research in 1991-1992.

Correspondence concerning this article should be addressed to JoNell Adair Usher, Graduate School of Arts and Sciences, 202 Administration Building, Emory University, Atlanta, Georgia 30322. Electronic mail may be sent to psyg4906@emoryul.bitnet.

experience at a known age in early childhood and then asked a series of questions about their memory of it. Four expe- riences served as targets: the birth of a younger sibling, a hospitalization of at least one night, the death of a family member, and a family move to a new home. In many cases, we were able to check the accuracy of the subjects’ recall with their parents. The possible confounding role of external information sources was addressed with internal controls. Our results suggest that the offset of childhood amnesia— that is, the earliest age from which something can be re- membered into adulthood—varies with what has been ex- perienced; some events are more memorable than others. For hospitalization and the birth of a sibling, the critical age is appreciably earlier than previous estimates have suggested.

It seems likely that more than one factor is responsible for childhood amnesia. Many theories of the phenomenon have been proposed, and more than one may be right. Although our research was not explicitly designed to test any of those the- ories, two particularly plausible ones are worth mentioning here. One likely contributing factor is the immaturity of the infant nervous system (Pillemer & White, 1989; Spear, 1979). The hippocampus, for example, is not fully developed at birth. In view of the known involvement of the hippo- campus with adult episodic memory, several authors have proposed that the late maturation of this structure may play a role in childhood amnesia (Nadel & Zola-Morgan, 1984; White & Pillemer, 1979).

Although this explanation seems plausible enough, it can- not provide a full explanation of the phenomenon. Two-and- a-half-year-old children readily recall events that took place 6 months earlier (Fivush & Hamond, 1990), so their episodic memory systems must be in place. Why, then, are memories from this later period also forgotten so completely? We be- lieve that their inaccessibility results from the changes in cognitive structure that accompany development (Neisser, 1962; Schachtel, 1947). Because of those changes, the ex- periences of childhood do not fit adult “schemata,” hence they can no longer be brought to mind. A modern version of this theory might place particular emphasis on the life nar- rative (called the “remembered self in Neisser, 1988).

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156 JoNELL ADAIR USHER AND ULRIC NEISSER

Adults think of their lives—past, present, and future—in terms of a series of well-defined periods and milestones that constitute a rich retrieval structure and thus facilitate recall. Young children do not have this schema; they do not think of their experiences as comprising a personal narrative. That narrative will develop later, but it can hardly facilitate recall of experiences that occurred before it began.

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Journal of Experimental Psychology