What is prospective memory?
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When we talk about memory, usually, we have in mind our ability to remember events and information from the past like where we parked a car, a name of a former colleague or what happened at a last committee meeting. This type of Retrospective Memory has been studied by psychologists for more than a century. However, in everyday life, people often have to remember to do things in future like remembering to take medication, make phone calls, pay bills on time, post letters or switch off domestic appliances. This type of memory has been termed Prospective Memory.
In early 1980s, when I started doing research on Prospective Memory, there were only a handful of studies on this topic. In the past 15 years, however, Prospective Memory is becoming one of the most vibrant and fast expanding areas of research in memory psychology. This is not surprising given that Prospective Memory is vital for successful and independent everyday living. When people complain about their memory, they usually are more concerned with prospective than retrospective memory failures as forgetting to carry out intended tasks and plans can seriously disrupt day-to-day activities and have undesirable consequences in a variety of settings (e.g., medical, educational) and populations. Therefore, studying mechanisms underlying Prospective Memory and how to improve it is of great importance both practically and theoretically.
In early 1980s, when I started doing research on Prospective Memory, there were only a handful of studies on this topic. In the past 15 years, however, Prospective Memory is becoming one of the most vibrant and fast expanding areas of research in memory psychology. This is not surprising given that Prospective Memory is vital for successful and independent everyday living. When people complain about their memory, they usually are more concerned with prospective than retrospective memory failures as forgetting to carry out intended tasks and plans can seriously disrupt day-to-day activities and have undesirable consequences in a variety of settings (e.g., medical, educational) and populations. Therefore, studying mechanisms underlying Prospective Memory and how to improve it is of great importance both practically and theoretically.
OUR research on prospective memory
Research on Prospective Memory has been systematically conducted at the University of Hertfordshire since 1995. This research has primarily focused on three broad and overlapping themes: (1) the development of Prospective Memory in children, (2) changes occurring in old age, and (2) examining mechanisms that bring Prospective Memory tasks to consciousness at the right time in the absence of any explicit prompts.
(1) Prospective Memory in Children
Initial research on children’s Prospective Memory was funded by the Leverhulme Trust in 1998. This funding helped us to test and develop appropriate methods for studying Prospective Memory in children and to examine the role of several variables (e.g., age, task interruption, prospective cues, etc.) on Prospective Memory performance. More recent research examines children’s understanding of their own Prospective and Retrospective Memory abilities (metamemory) and how their metamemory prediction accuracy and the actual performance compares to that of younger adults (collaborator Ruth Ford). We are also studying prospective memory in children with Autism Spectrum Disorder and have managed to test Prospective Memory in a group of children with more severe symptoms (collaborators Nuala Ryder and Dan Sheppard).
(2) Prospective Memory in Older Adults
Effects of age on Prospective Memory is one of the most intensively studied topics in Prospective Memory literature. This research has produced somewhat inconsistent findings about age effects on laboratory tasks of Prospective Memory with some studies showing significant age effects and others showing no age effects. In addition, when older adults are tested in their everyday life with naturalistic tasks they perform as well as or even better than younger adults. This contrasting and counterintuitive pattern in and outside laboratory has been termed Prospective Memory and Ageing Paradox, and presents a challenge to prospective memory researchers. Our previous ageing project, funded by Economic and Social Research Council, resulted in findings which further confirmed the existence of paradoxical pattern within one sample of young and older adults and emphasised the importance of examining sub-groups of older adults in their 60s, 70s and 80s when comparing performance with young adults, instead of using only one group of older adults whose age ranges from 60 to 80+ years.
(3) Underlying Mechanisms
In everyday life, at the time when we have to remember the intended action, we are often engaged in some unrelated tasks and no one explicitly reminds us that it is now time to carry out the task. The main theoretical challenge therefore is to find out what brings the intention to our mind at the right moment? Our past and ongoing research projects try to shed some light on this question by studying effects of explicit and implicit reminders on prospective memory using both laboratory and diary methods of enquiry.