Reinstatement versus Reactivation Effects on Active Memory in Infants

• Published in: Journal of experimental child psychology Vol. 75; no. 2; pp. 93 - 115
• Main Authors: Adler, Scott A., Wilk, Amy, Rovee-Collier, Carolyn
• Format: Journal Article
• Language: English
• Published: San Diego, CA Elsevier Inc 01.02.2000; Elsevier; Elsevier BV
• Subjects: Babies; Biological and medical sciences; Child development; Child psychology; Comparative Analysis; Conditioning, Classical - physiology; Developmental psychology; Female; Fundamental and applied biological sciences. Psychology; Humans; Infant; Infant Behavior; Infants; Long Term Memory; Male; Memory; Newborn. Infant; Novelty (Stimulus Dimension); Performance Factors; Psychology. Psychoanalysis. Psychiatry; Psychology. Psychophysiology; Random Allocation; reactivation; Reinforcement (Psychology); Reinstatement; reminders; Research Methodology; retention; Retention (Psychology); Sensitivity and Specificity; Specificity; Time Factors; Visual Stimuli; reminders; infants; reinstatement; specificity; reactivation; long-term memory; retention; Human; Memory retrieval; Memory; Infant; Cognition; Cognitive development; Experimental study; Retention; Long term
• ISSN: 0022-0965; 1096-0457
• DOI: 10.1006/jecp.1999.2531

Reinstatement and reactivation are procedurally different reminder paradigms used with infants and children, but most developmental psychologists do not distinguish between them. In 4 experiments with 102 three-month-olds, we asked if they differ functionally as well. Independent groups of infants received either a reactivation or a reinstatement reminder 3 days after training, when the memory is active, but its specific details have been forgotten. In Experiment 1, we measured retention after increasing delays until infants forgot altogether. A single reinstatement protracted retention twice as long after training as a single reactivation. In Experiments 2–4, whether the reminder was the original training stimulus or a novel one differentially affected the duration and specificity of memory in the 2 procedures as well. These data demonstrate that the distinction between reinstatement and reactivation is not artificial. In addition to differing procedurally, reinstatement and reactivation differ functionally, with different memory-preserving effects.