# @science on Instagram

- **Type:** Image
- **Original URL:** https://www.instagram.com/p/DUjdEquE3Pl
- **Gondola URL:** https://gondola.cc/posts/56037306-science-instagram
- **Thumbnail:** https://img.gondola.cc/tr:w-,h-,fo-auto/postThumbnails/babd546ca5.jpg
- **Posted:** 2026-02-09T22:30:13.000+00:00
- **Account Owner:** Science 🧬 (@science) — https://gondola.cc/science

## Caption

In research published in the journal Memory, Patricia Bauer and her colleague Marina Larkina brought in groups of 3-year-olds with a parent (typically a mother, as in most child development studies). The parent interviewed the child about events that had happened over the prior three months, like a visit to a zoo or preschool, while the researchers videotaped.⁠
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Over the next 6 years, different groups of children came back at ages 5, 6, 7, 8, or 9 to the lab and were questioned by the scientists on the events that happened when they were 3. Since the researchers knew the details of the events, they were able to probe exactly how much the kids remembered — and how they spoke about the memories.⁠
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The result? If the kids were between 5 and 7 at the time of the second interview, they remembered over 60% of events, Bauer tells KinderLab. But the children who were 8 and 9 remembered 40% or fewer of the events, and they had begun to talk about their memories in a different way.⁠
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“We think that it has to do with basic biological processes, as neural structures undergo a lot of postnatal development,” says Bauer. “Early in development, those structures are working, but not very efficiently — children are forming memories, but through natural processes, those are fading and becoming inaccessible. By the time you reach adulthood, those memories are working very effectively.”⁠
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Parents also have an effect on kids’ memories of events. Those who use an elaborative strategy with their little ones, asking lots of questions like “Tell me more” and “What happened?” and allowing the kids to guide the description, end up with kids who have earlier and more robust memories, says Bauer.⁠
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#kid #child #children #remembering #memory #science #biology

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## Tags

children, remembering, science, memory, kid, child, biology

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