In two experiments, a recognition test was used to investigate the effects of emotional words and pictures on explicit memory. In Experiment 1, participants viewed a list of positive, negative, and neutral pictures and in Experiment 2, a list of positive, negative, and neutral words was shown to participants. A recognition test was conducted after a 30 minute interval. Results showed that pictures were remembered better than words. Positive emotional contents had an advantage in explicit memory when compared to negative contents. There was also evidence to suggest that explicit memory was suppressed when contents were negative. The findings provided evidence for the significant role of valence on explicit memory recognition processes.