Maturation and
Infant Memory
Hannah Weaver, Orlett
Colorado, Thomas Majors,
Olivia Cook
Normal Development
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Every infant develops on their own timetable
General stages of development exist, but
every baby reaches them at their own pace
Some develop certain skills more quickly,
while other more slowly
In normal development babies develop in a
head-to-toe direction, 5 senses come first,
then motor skills develop, first the upper body
then the legs
What Was Your
Earliest
Memory? How
Old Were You?
Infantile Amnesia
 Infantile
Amnesia: the inability to recall the
earliest years of one’s life
 Generally from birth to about three years
old
 Study by University of Newfoundland
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Longitudinal Study: Asked kids ages 4-13 to recall
their earliest memories, then asked again two
years later
4-7 showed little overlap
10-13 had same memories
Crib Mobile Experiment
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Conducted by Carolyn Rovee-Collier
Started with her 2-month-old son, Benjamin,
colicky, was calmed by the mobile
Repeated with numerous other infants
Attached a cloth ribbon to infant’s foot
Infants would kick their foot to move the mobile
Results: Proved infants were capable of learning
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Learning was retained up to a month later
Learning only demonstrated with the original
mobile
Crib Mobile Experiment
Why Do You Think
We Don’t Recall
Memories From Our
Early Childhood?
(Think back to the
Memory chapter)
Growth of the Brain After Birth
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Born with all the neurons you’ll ever have
Brain isn’t fully developed at birth
Memory areas, like the hippocampus and
frontal lobes, mature into adolescence
Develop at a faster rate during your first year
then other years
Great plasticity during initial development
8 weeks: baby can differentiate shapes,
colors, tastes, pitches
Within a few weeks baby can recognize the
mother’s voice
Development
First Memories
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First memories occur during ages 4 and 5, when
infantile amnesia fades into remembered
experiences
Infants are capable of short term memories as
long as they are exposed repeatedly to stimuli
Brain processes the information before the age of
4, humans just can’t consciously recall the
information they processed
Fire evacuation (Pillemer, 1995)- confirmed
average age of earliest conscious memory is
around 3.5 years
Preschool classmate recall- conscious mind may
not remember, but the nervous system does
Why Don’t We Remember
Everything From Birth?
 Our
memory system isn’t fully developed
 The hippocampus and the frontal lobe
(key elements allowing us to remember)
aren’t yet developed
 They continue to develop throughout
infancy
How Do You Think
Past Experiences
From Our
Childhood Effect
Us If We Can’t
Remember Them?