Children's memory for a salient medical procedure : implications for testimony

Protecting sexually abused children hinges on their ability to remember and report events surrounding alleged incidents of abuse. This study was designed to provide information on young children's memory and recall of stressful experiences. Children's memory for features of a voiding cysto...

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Bibliographic Details
Published in:Pediatrics (Evanston) 1994-07, Vol.94 (1), p.17-23
Main Authors: MERRITT, K. A, ORNSTEIN, P. A, SPICKER, B
Format: Article
Language:English
Subjects:
Biological and medical sciences
Child
Child abuse & neglect
Child Abuse, Sexual
Child, Preschool
Children's memory
Evaluation
Female
Humans
Male
Medical research
Medical sciences
Memory
Memory in children
Mental Recall
Pediatrics
Psychology. Psychoanalysis. Psychiatry
Psychopathology. Psychiatry
Sex crimes
Stress, Psychological
Temperament
Urethra - diagnostic imaging
Urinary Bladder - diagnostic imaging
Urography - psychology
Victimology
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Summary:Protecting sexually abused children hinges on their ability to remember and report events surrounding alleged incidents of abuse. This study was designed to provide information on young children's memory and recall of stressful experiences. Children's memory for features of a voiding cystourethrogram (VCUG) experience were examined because this invasive procedure is similar in many respects to incidents of sexual abuse. The recall performance of 24 3- to 7-year-olds was assessed immediately after the VCUG and after a delay of 6 weeks using a hierarchically structured interview protocol including both open-ended and more specific questions. To assess correlations between recall performance and distress, behavioral and physiological indicators of distress were measured during the procedure. The children remembered 88% of the component features of the VCUG experience at the initial assessment and 83% after 6 weeks. Behavioral and salivary cortisol measures indicated that the children were distressed during the procedure. Although several of the behavioral measures were correlated negatively with the amount of recall, levels of salivary cortisol did not predict the children's recall performance. The findings suggest that, under some conditions, young children can provide accurate and detailed reports of personally experienced distressful events.
ISSN:0031-4005
1098-4275
DOI:10.1542/peds.94.1.17