Cross-cultural Invariance in Story Recall

TLDR

The study compared story recall among Liberian nonschooled children, nonliterate adults, nonschooled literate adults, and schooled literate adults, and then compared these results to similar data from American children and adults. Recall patterns were highly similar across all groups, with performance improving from childhood to adulthood, supporting the universality of schematic organization in memory. Mandler, Scripner, Cole, and DeForest (1980) published the article in *Child Development*.

Abstract

MANDLER, JEAN M.; SCRIBNER, SYLVIA; COLE, MICHAEL; and DEFOREST, MARSHA. CrOSs-cultural Invariance in Story Recall. CHILD DEVELOPMENT, 1980, 51, 19-26. A comparison was made of recall of stories by Liberian nonschooled children, nonliterate adults, nonschooled literate adults, and schooled literate adults. These data were then compared to similar data from American children and adults. Highly similar patterns of recall were found for all groups, although there was improvement in performance from childhood to adulthood. The data were used to support a hypothesis of the universality of certain kinds of schematic organization and their control of memorial processes.