A model for removing the increased recall of recent events from the temporal distribution of autobiographical memory

• Published in: Behavior research methods Vol. 43; no. 4; pp. 916 - 930
• Main Authors: Janssen, Steve M. J., Gralak, Anna, Murre, Jaap M. J.
• Format: Journal Article
• Language: English
• Published: New York Springer-Verlag 01.12.2011; Springer Nature B.V
• Subjects: Adolescent; Adult; Age; Age Factors; Aged; Aging; Algorithms; Amnesia; Behavioral Science and Psychology; Cognitive Psychology; Data processing; Female; Humans; Indexing in process; Internet; Male; Memory; Memory, Episodic; Mental Recall; Middle Aged; Models, Psychological; Product recalls; Psychology; Retention, Psychology; Studies; Aging; Adolescence; Reminiscence bump; Retention function; Autobiographical memory
• ISSN: 1554-3528; 1554-351X; 1554-3528
• DOI: 10.3758/s13428-011-0110-z

The reminiscence bump is the tendency to recall relatively many personal events from the period in which the individual was between 10 and 30 years old. This effect has only been found in autobiographical memory studies that used participants who were older than 40 years of age. The increased recall of recent events possibly obscures the reminiscence bump in the results of younger participants. In this study, a model was proposed that removes the increase for recent events from the temporal distribution. The model basically estimates a retention function based on the 10 most recent years from the observed distributions and divides the observed distributions by predictions derived from the estimated retention function. The model was examined with three simulated data sets and one experimental data set. The results of the experiment offered two practical examples of how the model could be used to investigate the temporal distribution of autobiographical memories.