ERIC Number: EJ975060
Record Type: Journal
Publication Date: 2012
Pages: 33
Abstractor: As Provided
ISBN: N/A
ISSN: ISSN-1525-0008
EISSN: N/A
Effects of Exogenous and Endogenous Distracters on Immediate and Long-Term Recall in Toddlers
Dixon, Wallace E., Jr.; Lawman, Hannah G.; Johnson, Elizabeth B. H.; May, Sarah; Patton, Leslie A.; Lowe, Allison K.; Snyder, Courtney M.
Infancy, v17 n5 p525-557 Sep-Oct 2012
We explored the role that exogenous and endogenous competitors for attention play in infants' abilities to encode and retain information over a 6-month period. Sixty-six children visited the laboratory at 15 months, and 32 returned for a second visit at 21 months. Children observed models of conventional- relation and enabling-relation action sequences. Half the children were distracted by a "Mister Monkey" mechanical toy during the conventional-relation sequence, while the other half was distracted during the enabling-relation sequence. The Early Childhood Behavior Questionnaire indexed endogenous factors at both ages. Immediate postmodel production of target actions indexed encoding efficiency, and 6-month production of target actions indexed long-term recall. The exogenous distracter impacted encoding efficiency (i.e., immediate recall), but not long-term recall. Endogenous factors (i.e., temperament) were primarily associated with long-term recall. Of special interest was our finding that endogenous factors, especially surgency, moderated the effect of the exogenous distracter. It appears that when learning "conventional-relation" sequences in the presence of exogenous distracters, surgency mobilizes attentional resources toward the learning objective; however, when learning "enabling-relation" sequences under the same conditions, surgency either boosts the saliency of the distracters or boosts children's susceptibility to them. (Contains 4 tables and 3 figures.)
Descriptors: Recall (Psychology), Toddlers, Infants, Attention Control, Retention (Psychology), Testing, Child Behavior, Questionnaires, Personality, Statistical Analysis, Multiple Regression Analysis, Correlation
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Publication Type: Journal Articles; Reports - Evaluative
Education Level: Early Childhood Education
Audience: N/A
Language: English
Sponsor: N/A
Authoring Institution: N/A
Grant or Contract Numbers: N/A