Do illustrations enhance preschoolers' memories for stories? Age-related change in the picture facilitation effect.

This study investigated whether illustrations facilitate story recall in preschoolers (N=58) 46 to 63 months of age. Each child was exposed to either a verbal story narrative with illustrations (Verbal and Picture condition), the narrative alone (Verbal Only condition), the narrative with uninformative illustrations (Verbal and Irrelevant Picture condition), or the illustrations alone (Picture Only condition). Children recalled the story immediately and after a 1-week delay.