Recognition Memory for Movement in Photographs: A Developmental Study

Abstract

The present studies investigated a phenomenon reported by Freyd (1983), later termed "representational momentum" (Freyd & Finke, 1984), in which adults′ recognition memory for movement in photographs is distorted forward in the direction of the implied motion. To determine whether children are subject to the same distortion, in Experiment 1, 8- and 10-year-olds and adults were shown a photograph of an action scene and asked to remember it. Subjects were then shown a second photograph that was either the same as or slightly different from the first. Subjects made more errors for test photographs showing the action slightly forward, as compared with slightly backward in time, indicating that their memories had shifted forward. This effect depends upon the initial depiction of movement; no forward memory errors occurred when "still" photographs without movement were employed in Experiment 2. Results are discussed in terms of the representational momentum hypothesis and picture memory.