The Language of Memory: Narrating Memories of Parents and Friends

Abstract

Abstract:The purpose of this study was to compare narrated memories of parents and friends, recounted by both males and females. A total of 177 Italian undergraduates were asked to recall and to write in detail one relevant memory regarding their relationship with either parents or friends during adolescence. Half of the participants wrote a narrative about parents and half about friends. Narratives were examined using both a content and a lexical linguistic method of analysis.The results showed that the language of memories was substantially influenced by the identity of the social partners that were part of the remembered events. In particular the ratio of negative emotion words to all words and the use of 'I' personal pronouns were higher when participants recounted memory narratives about parents rather than friends, and 'We' was used more in narratives about friends. Gender differences were found as well. The authors interpret the results as suggesting that the language of memory is affected by the type of interpersonal relationship that exists between the narrator and the other participants in the remembered events as well as by the gender of the narrator. In other words, memory narratives both reflect and are influenced by the relationships within which an individual is embedded.

Parents' traces in life: When and how parents are presented in spontaneous life narratives

“…This is partly because adolescents strive for emancipation from parents in order to establish social autonomy and their own personal identity (Laursen, Coy, & Collins, ). In contrast to other findings (Peterson et al, ; Smorti et al, ), we found females in the younger subsample spoke more negatively about their parents than males. Although daughters tend to have closer and warmer relationships with their parents than sons (Fingerman, ), the greater negativity of their parent‐related narratives might reflect their tendency to be more elaborate when depicting internal states (Fivush, Bohanek, Zaman, & Grapin, ; Fivush & Buckner, ; Grysman, ).…”

“…While parents remain important in people's life stories, the view on them changes with age. In congruence with other developmental findings (Larson, Richards, Moneta, Holmbeck, & Duckett, ; Smetana, Campione‐Barr, & Metzger, ; Smorti et al, ), we found an increase of negative evaluations of the parental relationship especially throughout adolescence. This is partly because adolescents strive for emancipation from parents in order to establish social autonomy and their own personal identity (Laursen, Coy, & Collins, ).…”

“…While children speak uncritically and positively about their parents (Goldin, 1969;Harris & Tseng, 1957), teenagers and early adults have many conflicts with them (Honess & Lintern, 1990). Accordingly, when comparing their close relationships, adolescents and early adults talk in a more negative tone about their parents than about their friends (Smorti, Peterson, & Tani, 2016) and report being more frequently bothered by their parents than by others, leading to ambivalent emotions toward parents (Fingerman & Hay, 2003). Yet, when asked to write a free response to the stimulus "Tell me about your parents," positive emotions such as love and gratitude predominate in adolescents' and emerging adults' narratives (Budziszewska, 2009).…”

English Mnemonic Lexicon: Constituent Structure and Verbalization Potential

“…Memory has traditionally been one of the central concepts in philosophy and psychology, but recent decades have seen its persistent penetration into other research fields (see Assmann, 2008;Erll, 2011;Halbwachs, 1997;Hirsch, 2008;Klein, 2000), linguistics being no exception (see Bragina, 2007;Chafe, 1973;Gasparov, 2010;Smorti, Peterson & Tani, 2016;Wierzbicka, 2007). Theories and models describing memorylanguage relationships vary significantly across fields and authors.…”