Of major interest to those concerned
with early mnemonic process and function is the question of whether early memories likely
encoded without the benefit of language later are accessible to verbal report. In the context of a
controlled laboratory study, we examined this question in children who were 16 and 20 months
at the time of exposure to specific target events and who subsequently were tested for their
memories of the events after a delay of either 6 or 12 months (at 22–32 months) and then
again at 3 years. At the first delayed-recall test, children evidenced memory both nonverbally and
verbally. Nonverbal mnemonic expression was related to age at the time of test; verbal
mnemonic expression was related to verbal fluency at the time of test. At the second
delayed-recall test, children evidenced continued accessibility of their early memories. Verbal
mnemonic expression was related to previous mnemonic expression, both nonverbal and verbal,
each of which contributed unique variance. The relevance of these findings on memory for
controlled laboratory events for issues of memory for traumatic experiences is discussed.