Role of visual richness in picture recognition memory

25 fourth graders, 21 eighth graders, and 21 college students were shown slides of objects presented as color photographs, black-and-white photographs, simple outline drawings, or printed words. After an 8-wk. delay, students were asked to discriminate the study slides from similar distractor slides. No significant differences were found among the types of pictures. Recognition of black-and-white photographs was superior to words.