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Are older adults in Hong Kong “living in history” in their autobiographical memories?
Author(s) -
Gu Xuan,
Tse ChiShing,
Chan Meingold HiuMing
Publication year - 2019
Publication title -
applied cognitive psychology
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 0.719
H-Index - 100
eISSN - 1099-0720
pISSN - 0888-4080
DOI - 10.1002/acp.3603
Subject(s) - autobiographical memory , psychology , cued speech , transition (genetics) , developmental psychology , cognition , cognitive psychology , psychiatry , biochemistry , chemistry , gene
Summary Transition theory posits that autobiographical memories are organized by major life transitions, which is often supported by the Living‐in‐History effect that occurs when people frequently refer to public events to support their date estimates of personal events. In the present study, 52 Chinese older adults in Hong Kong recalled autobiographical events using cue‐word method and justified the date estimates of the events. They also reported the most important events and assessed their impacts. Results showed that participants referred to public events only when estimating the date of 5.5% of word‐cued events and reported a few public events as personally important, suggesting an absence of the Living‐in‐History effect. Nonetheless, word‐cued events and important events accumulated around major life transitions to form a transition bump; the material change that important events brought about predicted whether the important events were used to organize autobiographical memory, thereby providing new evidence for the transition theory.