JOURNAL
OF EXPERIMENTAL
CHILD
33, 207-215 (1982)
PSYCHOLOGY
Developmental Differences in the Role of Detail
in Picture Recognition Memory
KATHY
Claremont
PEZDEK
Graduate
School
AND
HSUAN-CHIH
University
CHEN
of Kansas
Two experiments assess the effect of the amount of physical detail in pictures
on picture recognition memory. Children and adults were presented simple and
complex line drawings. A “same-different”
recognition test followed in which
the distractor items were original pictures from the presentation phase with the
amount of physical detail altered. For second- and fourth-grade subjects, recognition sensitivity, measured in terms of d’, was similar for pictures in the
simple and complex presentation conditions. For adults, however, recognition
sensitivity was greater for pictures in the simple than complex presentation
condition. This finding with adults was replicated in Experiment 2. Interpretations
of this age difference in picture memory processing are discussed, as well as the
constraints imposed by various dependent measures used in picture memory
studies.
It is now well accepted that individuals have an impressive ability to
recognize (Nickerson,
1965; Standing, Conezio, & Haber, 1970) and
recall (Bousfield, Esterson, & Whitmarsh,
1957) pictorial material. A
number of developmental
studies have reported that recognition of large
numbers of pictures (Hoffman & Dick, 1976) and recall and recognition
of visual objects (Dirks & Neisser, 1977; Mandler, Seegmiller, & Day,
1977) increase with age. The interesting developmental
question here is
the extent to which the younger and older subjects differ quantitatively
We acknowledge the assistance of Joseph Muga, Nancy Reed, and Robert Bennett in
collecting the data, and thank Gary W. Evans, Jean Mandler, and Ed Teyber for reading
earlier drafts and offering perceptive comments. We are also grateful for the cooperation
of the staff at Preston Elementary School in Rialto, California. Requests for reprints should
be sent to Kathy Pezdek, Psychology Department, Claremont Graduate School, Claremont,
CA 91711.
207
0022~0965/82/020207-09$02.00/O
Copyright
0 1982 by Academic Press, Inc.
All rights of reproduction
in any form resewed.
208
PEZDEKANDCHEN
in picture memory capacity, or qualitatively because they utilize different
memory processing strategies (cf. Myers & Perlmutter, 1978). This issue
is addressed in the present study by examining age differences in picture
memory as a function of the amount of detail in the pictures.
Several researchers have reported that memory for pictures is related
to the amount of physical detail in the pictures. Examining age differences
in picture memory as a function of the amount of detail in the pictures
is thus one way of isolating the basis of age differences in picture memory.
A second reason for varying the amount of detail in a picture to explore
age differences in picture memory stems from suggestions by Elkind
(1975) and Piaget (1969). They have reported that young children are
more likely than older children and adults to “perceptually
center” on
the dominant aspect of a perceptual field, at the expense of processing
peripheral information.
Similarly, Mackworth and Bruner (1970) found
that 6-year-old children scan pictures less systematically than adults and
are less likely to utilize long eye-tracks that link together important areas
of the pictures. These studies would suggest that memory of younger
children might be less affected than adults by the amount of noncentral
detail in a picture. This would perhaps account for the lower recognition
memory performance by younger subjects.
The research on the effect of the amount of detail in pictures on picture
memory has produced mixed results. Although Reese (1970) hypothesized that the retention of visual stimuli is positively related to the amount
of detail in the stimuli, the available data are less convincing. Support
for Reese’s hypothesis comes from studies that have utilized recall measures (Bevan & Steger, 1971; Evertson & Wicker, 1974). Recognition
measures, on the other hand, do not appear to be affected by the amount
of detail presented in pictures. Nelson, Metzler, and Reed (1974) used
a two-alternative forced choice test with adults and reported no difference
in recognition among items presented as black-and-white
photographs,
complex, embellished line drawings, or simple, unembellished line drawings. Emmerick and Ackerman (1976) tested children in a paired-associate
test and reported similar memory performance for items presented as
simple line drawings and more detailed line drawings.
In the present study, subjects from three age groups were presented
a series of pictures, half of which were chosen from the complex, embellished line drawings used by Nelson et al. (1974) and half were simple,
unembellished
line drawings from the same study. At the time of test,
recognition
pictures were presented one at a time in a “same-different”
test. Half of the simple and complex line drawings were tested in the
“same” form that they had been presented in. The other half of the test
pictures; that is, pictures previously presented
items were “changed”
in a simple form were tested with complex versions of the same pictures,
and pictures previously presented in a complex form were tested with
simple versions of the same pictures. The simple and complex versions
PICTURERECOGNITION
MEMORY
209
of each picture contained the same central information,
but extra peripheral details, shading, and embellishment
were added in the complex
pictures. The present study thus scrutinizes age differences in picture
memory by comparing recognition memory for pictures as a function of
the amount of detail in the pictures.
EXPERIMENT
1
Method
Subjects and design. Subjects were selected from three age groups.
Twenty second graders and 20 fourth graders participated from Preston
Elementary School, Rialto, California. The adult subjects were 20 undergraduates who volunteered from classes at California State College,
San Bernardino. Ten males and 10 females participated in each age group.
All subjects viewed simple and complex line drawings in the presentation
phase, and were tested with “same” and “changed” test items. The
study thus can be described as a 3 x 2 x 2 factorial design with age
as a between-subjects factor and presentation form and test form as
within-subjects factors.
Materials. Eighty-eight pictures were selected from the set of materials
used by Nelson et al. (1974). Each of 44 basic pictures had been drawn
in both a simple, unembellished
line drawing form, and a complex, embellished line drawing form, for a total of 88 pictures. All drawings were
black and white. The simple and complex forms of each picture contained
the same central information,
with extra shading and fine-grain details
added to both the principal figure and the background in the complex
pictures. The use of the materials by Nelson et al. (1974) strengthens
this study by allowing a comparison of results with other studies without
the confounding effect of different materials. The use of this standard
set of materials is particularly important in this study because it is so
difficult to quantify “amount of detail” in pictures. In this way, extraneous variables involving the stimulus materials are held constant in
order to focus on the factors of interest in this study. Examples of
stimulus pictures are shown in Fig. 1.
Procedure. Subjects participated
individually.
They were presented
a sequence of slides including 44 presentation pictures, followed by a
3-min delay task, and then 44 test pictures. The presentation pictures
included 22 simple line drawings and 22 complex line drawings. In the
presentation phase, subjects were instructed to study each picture carefully, as it would be important in a later part of the experiment. The
pictures were presented on slides by a Kodak Carousel slide projector
with a shutter attachment regulated by a msec timer. During the presentation phase, slides were presented for 8 set each.
The test sequence consisted of 22 “same” pictures from the presentation phase-l 1 simple and 11 complex. The remaining 22 test pictures
were “changed” versions of the presentation pictures. The 11 “changed”
210
PEZDEK
SIMPLE
AND CHEN
COMPLEX
r
FIG. 1. Examples of pictures in both simple and complex form.
versions of the simple pictures from the presentation phase were the
complex versions of these pictures. The 11 “changed” versions of the
complex presentation pictures were the simple versions of these pictures.
Thus, each of the 44 presentation pictures was included once in the test
phase, in either the “same” or “changed” form.
In the test phase, subjects viewed pictures one at a time at a rate
controlled by the experimenter. For each picture the experimenter asked,
“Is this picture the same as a picture you saw before, or are there some
changes in this picture?” Several practice slides were shown first to
ensure that the subjects understood what types of changes constituted
“changed” test items. The sequence of presentation and test slides was
arranged in two orders. Half of the subjects in each age group were
randomly assigned to each order. The intervening delay task was included
between presentation and test to insure that the test that followed measured long-term memory. In the delay task subjects circled all of the
number two’s on a random number sheet for 3 min.
Results
The data were scored in terms of the mean percentage correct for
subjects in each age group, as a function of the condition of presentation
and the condition of test. These data appear at the top of Table 1. As
can be seen in Table 1, the pattern of results was very different for
“same” and “changed” test items. This suggests that response bias as
PICTURE
RECOGNITION
TABLE
MEAN
PERCENTAGE
211
MEMORY
1
CORRECTAND d’ VALUES IN EACH EXPERIMENTAL
EXPERIMENT
CONDITION
IN
1
Percentage Correct
Presentation condition:
Test condition:
Second graders
Fourth graders
Adults
Simple
“Same”
Complex
“Changed”
67.9
82.0
71.0
64.0
62.0
83.8
“Same”
73.4
83.8
68.7
“Changed”
58.5
59.2
66.5
d'
Presentation condition:
Second graders
Fourth graders
Adults
Simple
Complex
1.04
1.44
2.03
1.07
1.52
1.18
well as recognition sensitivity affected the percent accuracy data. The
data were thus converted to the signal detection measure of d’. (See
Banks, 1970, for an explanation of Signal Detection Theory.) The procedure suggested by Hochhaus (1972) was followed for calculating d’
values. The mean d’ values for each age group in each experimental
condition are presented in the bottom portion of Table 1.
A 3 (age) x 2 (presentation form) analysis of variance was performed
on the d’ data. The only significant effect was the age x presentation
form interaction, F(2, 57) = 4.75, MS, = S73, p -=c.OS. As can be seen
in Table 1, the second and fourth graders were similarly sensitive to
pictures in the simple and complex presentation conditions. The adults,
however, were more sensitive to pictures in the simple than complex
presentation condition.
The result that adults were more accurate recognizing pictures in the
simple than complex presentation condition is inconsistent with previous
findings, especially those of Nelson et al. (1974). There are several procedural differences between the present study and previous studies that
have reported different results. However, before considering these
points, it was deemed necessary to replicate the finding with adults.
Experiment 2 was thus conducted to test the replicability
of the adult
data in Experiment
1.
EXPERIMENT 2
Method
Subjects. Thirty-six adults volunteered to participate from classes at
California State College, San Bernardino. Sex of subject was not specifically controlled for.
212
PEZDEK
AND CHEN
Materials, procedure, and design. The materials and procedure were
the same as those used in Experiment 1. The design was a 2 (simple and
complex presentation condition) x 2 (“same” and “changed” test condition) within-subjects
design. To test the generalizability
of the effect
from Experiment
1, in Experiment
2 the assignment of presentation
condition and test condition to each of the 44 pictures, and the order
of presenting the items was generated using a different random order
than was used in the first experiment. All other procedures were the
same in the two experiments.
Results
The mean percentage correct data were calculated across subjects as
a function of the condition of presentation and the condition of test.
These results appear in Table 2. The more important results, however,
for comparison with Experiment 1 are the d’ findings. As can be seen
in Table 2, these adult subjects were more accurate recognizing pictures
in the simple presentation condition (d’ = 3.07) than in the complex
presentation condition (d’ = 1.92), t(35) = 4.98, p < .Ol. The direction
of this effect clearly replicates the adult data in Experiment
1.
DISCUSSION
The direction of the significant age x presentation form interaction
suggests that the children and the adults in the present study processed
pictures in memory very differently, despite the absence of a significant
main effect of age on recognition sensitivity. The result that second and
fourth graders were similarly sensitive recognizing items presented as
simple and complex pictures, is consistent with recognition data of Emmerick and Ackerman (1976) with 4- and Syear-old children. However,
these results contradict hypotheses by Reese and others who have sugTABLE
MEAN
PERCENTAGE
2
CORRECT AND d’ VALUES IN EACH EXPERIMENTAL
EXPERIMENT 2
CONDITION
IN
Percentage Correct
Presentation condition:
Test condition:
Simple
“Same”
Complex
“Changed”
88.8
87.8
d’
Presentation condition:
Simple
Complex
3.07
1.92
“Same”
81.8
“Changed”
74.2
PICTURE
RECOGNITION
MEMORY
213
gested that the retention of visual stimuli is positively related to the
amount of detail in the stimuli.
Nelson et al. (1974) have offered one explanation that handles the
similar recognition sensitivity for simple and complex presentation pictures by the children in the present study. They suggested that a conservation of processing
might be operating at the time of encoding information from pictures. That is, in a fixed amount of processing time,
a constant amount of information is encoded, regardless of the amount
of information
in a picture. Thus, subjects would encode many details
in a complex picture, but relatively less information about each detail.
In a simple picture, subjects would encode fewer details, but more information about each detail. As a result, the total amount of information
stored would be the same for simple and complex pictures, and recognition accuracy would not be affected by the extra detail in the complex
pictures.
Contrary to the results with children, adults in both Experiments
1
and 2 were more sensitive recognizing pictures in the simple than complex
presentation conditions. As can be seen in the top portion of Table 1
and Table 2, the higher d’ value in the simple presentation condition by
adults, can be accounted for by the higher recognition accuracy for
changed simple presentation items as compared with changed complex
presentation items. At the time of test, the additional detail in changed
simple pictures was apparently more salient to adults than the deleted
detail in changed complex pictures. Another interpretation
of these results is that adults were more likely than children to thematically encode
the pictures. Such thematic encodings would be expected to retain relevant details but omit irrelevant details. The greater recognition sensitivity to simple than complex pictures by adults fits this interpretation.
The adult data is inconsistent with previous relevant findings, most
notably Nelson et al. (1974). Although the stimulus pictures in the present
study were drawn from the pool of items used by Nelson et al., there
are two important procedural differences between the two studies. First,
the distractor test pictures in the present study were changed versions
of original pictures. Nelson et al. utilized completely new pictures as
distractor items. Second, Nelson et al. utilized a two-alternative forced
choice recognition test, whereas a “same-different”
recognition test was
used in the present study. Thus, the present study included a more
difficult task and tested memory for the specific details in each picture,
whereas Nelson et al. tested general familiarity with each picture.
The absence of an increase in picture recognition accuracy with age
in the present study is not consistent with previous findings (cf. Hoffman
& Dick, 1976). The “same-different”
recognition task in the present
study specifically tests memory for the detail retained in each picture
rather than simply testing general familiarity with the pictures. Picture
214
PEZDEK
AND CHEN
memory studies that have used recall tests or forced choice recognition
tests with completely new distractor test items test general rather than
specific picture memory. Whereas general picture memory accuracy has
been reported to improve with age, the present study reports that this
is not the case when memory for specific details in pictures is tested.
One shortcoming of the present study occurred as a result of using
the existing sets of simple and complex pictures of Nelson et al. (1974).
The extra detail in the complex version of each picture had been added
with the restriction that it be irrelevant to the central theme of the picture.
However, in some pictures the extra detail was added primarily to the
figure and in some pictures the extra detail was added primarily to the
background context. An additional experiment would be necessary to
examine the relative effects of relevant/irrelevant
detail as compared
with figure/context detail.
The results of this study suggest that although adults and children are
very accurate at discriminating
between pictures they have seen before
and those they have not seen, they actually do not remember a large
portion of the information
contained in any particular visual stimulus.
Tests that demonstrate that subjects are able to distinguish completely
new pictures from pictures that they have seen before simply reveal that
the subjects retained enough information from old pictures to differentiate
them from new ones. Exactly how much of the information in a visual
stimulus is retained cannot be answered from much of the previous
picture memory research. The results reported here concur with the few
studies that have explored how much information in a picture is retained
in memory. Nickerson and Adams (1979), for example, found that adults’
memory for the visual details on a common United States penny is
remarkably poor. Similarly Mandler (cf. Mandler & Johnson, 1976) reported that subjects’ recognition for specific types of descriptive and
spatial transformations
in complex pictures was less than 67% correct.
Together, these findings suggest that picture recognition memory is not
“unlimited,”
as described by Haber (1970), and further, that various
measures of picture memory tap very different aspects of what is
retained.
This study concludes that adults and second- and fourth-grade children
process and remember physical information in pictures qualitatively differently. Additional
research in this area is necessary before a more
specific account of the processing changes that underlie these developmental differences is forthcoming.
These findings suggest that not only
does the role of detail in picture memory differ developmentally,
but it
also varies with the specific dependent measure used.
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RECEIVED:
February 7, 1980;
REVISED:
January 13, 1981, May 5, 1981.