Influence of Emotion on Memory for Temporal Information.

Abstract

Contextual information, such as color and spatial location, has been found to be better remembered for emotional than for neutral items. The current study examined whether the influence of emotion extends to memory for another fundamental feature of episodic memory: temporal information. Results from a list-discrimination paradigm showed that (a) item memory was enhanced for both negative and positive pictures compared with neutral ones and was better for negative than for positive pictures and (b) temporal information was better remembered for negative than for positive and neutral pictures, whereas positive and neutral pictures did not differ from each other. These findings are discussed in relation to the processes involved in memory for temporal information.