Linking the Puzzle Pieces of the Past: A Study of Relational Memory in Children with Autism Spectrum Disorder.
Kids with autism create more false memories, so tighten task structure and double-check their recall.
01Research in Context
What this study did
Giesbers et al. (2020) watched kids with autism and typical kids do a picture-memory game. The kids saw sets of photos, then picked which new photos fit the old set. The task forced them to link items by shared themes.
The team tracked right and wrong picks. They counted false alarms — times a child picked a lure photo that only seemed to fit.
What they found
Children with autism chose more lure photos than typical peers. They also got fewer correct answers overall.
The gap showed up in every memory set. The authors say the kids’ memory links were less stable, so false pieces slipped in.
How this fits with other research
Price et al. (2025) ran a near-copy task with autistic adults and found equal false-memory rates. Same test, older group, opposite result. The clash is mostly about age: kids still build relational skills; adults have already found work-arounds.
Bhaumik et al. (2009) saw teens with autism fail when timing told the link. H et al. add false alarms to the picture, showing the weakness starts younger and shows up even without time pressure.
Perez et al. (2015) found poorer pattern separation in adults — another hippocampal job. Together the papers trace one line: from fuzzy links in kids to mixed-up details in adults.
Why it matters
If you test recall with kids who have ASD, expect extra guesses that sound right. Keep arrays short, use clear categories, and check answers against photos or notes. Cut lure chances by previewing what ‘doesn’t belong’ before you start.
Want CEUs on This Topic?
The ABA Clubhouse has 60+ free CEUs — live every Wednesday. Ethics, supervision & clinical topics.
Join Free →Show the client the target set, then point to one foil and say, ‘This will never fit,’ before you begin the memory game.
02At a glance
03Original abstract
Our memories are made of detailed sensory information representing the puzzle pieces of our personal past. The type of memory integrating sensory features is referred to as relational memory. The main objective of this study was to investigate whether relational memory is affected in children with autism spectrum disorder (ASD) since altered relational memory may contribute to atypical episodic memory observed in ASD. We also examined the association between perceptual style and relational memory abilities. Children with ASD (n = 14) and typically developed (TD) children (n = 16, 9-15 years old) completed a memory task with three conditions: two single-feature conditions measuring memory for objects and locations, and one relational memory condition measuring memory for objects and their locations combined. The Children's embedded figures test was administered to measure perceptual style. The ASD group selected more incorrect stimuli (false alarms) than the TD group, resulting in a lower proportion of correctly recognized targets across all memory conditions. The ASD group did not display a more local perceptual style than the TD group. However, perceptual style was associated with improved memory abilities across conditions. Our findings indicate that the overall memory performance of children with ASD is less stable, leading them to more incorrect responses than TD children. This may be due to the executive demands of the memory tasks, rather than specific impairments in memory binding. Autism Res 2020, 13: 1959-1969. © 2020 International Society for Autism Research and Wiley Periodicals LLC LAY SUMMARY: The present study shows that children with autism have a less stable memory than typically developed children, which is reflected in a higher amount of incorrect memory responses. Overall, our results indicate that children with autism display difficulties in differentiating previously studied from novel information when solving both single-feature memory tasks and a relational memory task (requiring memory of combination of features). These difficulties may have implications for how children with autism remember episodes from their personal past.
Autism research : official journal of the International Society for Autism Research, 2020 · doi:10.1002/aur.2379