ERP Correlates of Prospective Memory and Cue Focality in Children.

Prospective memory (PM) is essential in the everyday activities of children because it involves remembering intentions for the future, such as doing their homework or bringing written parental permissions to school. Developmental studies have shown increases in PM performance throughout childhood, but the specific processes underlying this development are still under debate. In the present study, event-related potentials were used to examine whether the focality of the PM task is related to the PM increments by testing two groups of children (first and last cycle of primary school) and assessing differences in N300 (cue detection), frontal positivity (switching), parietal positivity (retrieval of the intention) and frontal slow waves (monitoring of the retrieved intention).

Event versus activity-based cues and motivation in school-related prospective memory tasks.

Prospective memory (PM), the ability to remember an intention in the future, is essential to children's everyday lives. We explored age differences (6- to 7- vs. 10- to 11-year-olds) in PM depending on the nature of the task and the children's motivation.

The Cost of Prospective Memory in Children: The Role of Cue Focality.

Prospective memory (PM) is an essential ability in daily life, since it involves remembering to perform an intention. While PM largely develops during childhood and adolescence, its underlying mechanisms are still poorly understood. In general, age differences in PM have been found with tasks in which the prospective cues are not part of the ongoing activity (non-focal PM tasks).