Recent Reminders with Word-Image Information Can Improve Children’s Prospective Memory Performance

Children’s prospective memory is not yet mature, and setting reminders is an effective method to improve their prospective memory. This study aimed to explore how reminders, placed at different distances from prospective memory cues, affect children’s prospective memory under different attention load conditions. A total of 170 primary school students aged 7–12 (M = 9.54, SD = 1.68) took part in the experiment in a laboratory environment. The experimental program was presented using E-prime 2.0 on one desktop computer. This study used a 3 (reminder conditions: recent reminder, distant reminder, control condition) × 2 (attention loads: low, high) between-subjects design. The results showed that in both low and high attention load conditions, the accuracy of prospective memory in the recent reminder condition was much higher than that in both the distant reminder and control conditions. The accuracy of ongoing tasks under the recent reminder condition was also significantly higher than that under the distant reminder and control conditions. The results showed that recent reminders can improve children’s prospective memory performance while reducing attentional expenditure, and the promoting effect of recent reminders on children’s prospective memory was not affected by attentional loads.