Time course of effects of emotion on item memory and source memory for Chinese words

► We study time course of effects of emotion on item memory and source memory for Chinese words. ► Negative emotion enhances free recall, whereas there is only a trend that positive emotion enhances free recall; in addition, the enhancement effect of emotion on free recall becomes more marked only within a certain frame of time. ► Negative emotion reduces recognition, whereas positive emotion has no effect on recognition. ► Neither positive nor negative emotion has any effect on source memory.