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Updated: Aug 12, 2026

Examining Recall Memory in Infancy and Early Childhood Using the Elicited Imitation Paradigm
Published on: April 28, 2016
Mediated imitation in 6-month-olds: remembering by association
R Barr1, A Vieira, C Rovee-Collier
1Rutgers University, Piscataway, NJ 08854-8020, USA.
Abstract:
In two experiments with 72 6-month-olds, we examined whether associating an imitation task with an operant task affects infants' memory for either task. In Experiment 1, infants who imitated target actions that were modeled for 60 s on a hand puppet remembered them for only 1 day. We hypothesized that if infants associated the puppet imitation task with a longer-remembered operant task, then they might remember it longer too. In Experiment 2, infants learned to press a lever to activate a miniature train-a task 6-month-olds remember for 2 weeks-and saw the target actions modeled immediately afterward. These infants successfully imitated for up to 2 weeks, but only if the train memory was retrieved first. A follow-up experiment revealed that the learned association was bidirectional. This is the first demonstration of mediated imitation in 6-month-olds across two very different paradigms and reveals that associations are an important means of protracting memories.
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