We report the 1st example of a true complementarity effect in memory development--a situation in which memory for the "same event" simultaneously becomes more and less accurate between early childhood and adulthood. We investigated this paradoxical effect because fuzzy-trace theory predicts that it can occur in paradigms that produce…

S. Ghetti (2008) and M. L. Howe (2008) presented probative ideas for future research that will deepen scientific understanding of developmental reversals on false memory and establish boundary conditions for these counterintuitive patterns. Ghetti extended the purview of current theoretical principles by formulating hypotheses about how…

Reyna and Brainerd supplement arguments they made previously in this issue by advancing five additional reasons for preferring output-interference explanations over the resources hypothesis. (RH)

Proposes an interference explanation of data from dual-task studies of memory development. Dual-task data support the resources hypothesis that memory processes tax a common pool of cognitive energy, which has been variously called attentional, mental effort, and working-memory capacities. Suggests that dual-task deficits are instances of output…

Two experiments involving students from grades 1-2 and 5-6 found strong connections between development and forgetting rates when the influences of learning ability were eliminated. Findings eliminated a hypothesis based on age variability in overlearning. (RH)

Presents a conjoint recognition paradigm and a model that quantifies conscious and unconscious memory for learned materials and for the types of unlearned materials found to induce false memories in children. Validation study showed that model accounted for 7- and 10-year-olds' performance on recognition memory task. Conscious and unconscious…

Presents a unified theoretical approach to children's false-memory reports that deals with both spontaneous and implanted reports. Details false recognition and misinformation models that allow researchers to determine the impact of identity judgment, nonidentity judgment, and similarity judgment in false memory reports. (LBT)

The counterintuitive developmental trend in the Deese-Roediger-McDermott (DRM) illusion (that false-memory responses increase with age) was investigated in learning-disabled and nondisabled children from the 6- to 14-year-old age range. Fuzzy-trace theory predicts that because there are qualitative differences in how younger versus older children…

Data were generally consistent with the view that preschoolers and elementary schoolers can respond to memory probes by applying arithmetical processing to running gist from recently solved problems. Discussed are two competing interpretations of the development of working memory: fuzzy-trace theory and the generic-resources hypothesis. (Author/RH)

Recent work on memory independence and memory interference in cognitive development has been conducted under fuzzy trace theory. Both memory-to-reasoning and reasoning-to-memory interferences were detected in 3 studies of inferences from stories by 94 4- and 5-year olds and 94 7- and 8-year olds. (SLD)

Two experiments used causal models to examine possible relationships among age, learning rates, learning opportunities and forgetting rates. Found that forgetting rates declined markedly between early and late childhood. (ET)