scholarly journals No Evidence of Word-Level Uncertainty in Younger and Older Adults in Self-Paced Reading

2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Michael G Cutter ◽  
Kevin Paterson ◽  
Ruth Filik
Keyword(s):  
Older Adults ◽  
Normal Aging ◽  
Perceptual Processing ◽  
Prior Work ◽  
Theoretical Level ◽  
Younger Adults ◽  
Word Level ◽  
Spatial Frequencies ◽  
Main Effect ◽  
Reading Study

In a self-paced reading study, we investigated whether older adults maintain a greater level of uncertainty about the identity of words in a sentence than younger adults, potentially due to deficits in visuo-perceptual processing of high-spatial frequencies associated with normal aging. In the experiment, 60 older adults and 60 younger adults read sentences in which an early preposition was either perceptually confusable with another word (at; confusable with as) or not (toward), and in which the reading of a subsequent ambiguous verb (e.g. tossed) should be affected by the confusability of the preposition, while the reading of an unambiguous verb (e.g. thrown) should not be. This design replicated that of an earlier study which found evidence in favour of participants maintaining uncertainty about the confusable preposition (Levy et al., 2009). However, in our study there was no evidence that either younger or older adults maintained uncertainty about the identity of the perceptually confusable preposition, such that there was no interaction between the preposition’s form and subsequent verb ambiguity, although we did observe a main effect of verb ambiguity. This represents a failure to replicate this prior work by Levy et al., and we consider potential causes of our findings at both a methodological and theoretical level.

scholarly journals No evidence of word-level uncertainty in younger and older adults in self-paced reading

2021 ◽  
pp. 174702182110459
Author(s):  
Michael G Cutter ◽  
Kevin B Paterson ◽  
Ruth Filik
Keyword(s):  
Older Adults ◽  
Normal Aging ◽  
Perceptual Processing ◽  
Experimental Paradigm ◽  
Theoretical Level ◽  
Younger Adults ◽  
Word Level ◽  
Spatial Frequencies ◽  
Main Effect ◽  
Reading Study

In a self-paced reading study, we investigated whether older adults maintain a greater level of uncertainty about the identity of words in a sentence than younger adults, potentially due to deficits in visuo-perceptual processing of high-spatial frequencies associated with normal aging. In the experiment, 60 older adults and 60 younger adults read sentences in which an early preposition was either perceptually confusable with another word ( at; confusable with as) or not ( toward), and in which the reading of a subsequent ambiguous verb (e.g., tossed) should be affected by the confusability of the preposition, while the reading of an unambiguous verb (e.g., thrown) should not be. This design replicated that of an earlier study conducted by Levy et al. (2009) that found evidence in favour of participants maintaining uncertainty about the confusable preposition in go-past times during natural reading. However, in our study, there was no evidence that either younger or older adults maintained uncertainty about the identity of the perceptually confusable preposition, such that there was no interaction between the preposition’s form and subsequent verb ambiguity in self-paced reading times, although we did observe a main effect of verb ambiguity. This represents a failure to replicate the effect observed by Levy et al. when using a different experimental paradigm, and we consider potential causes of our findings at both a methodological and theoretical level.

The Context of Caution: An Examination of Age, Social Context, and Sex on Measures of Inhibitory Control and Risky Decision-Making

2019 ◽  
Vol 90 (1) ◽  
pp. 84-103 ◽  
Author(s):  
Raquel A. Cowell ◽  
Elizabeth R. Paitel ◽  
Sierra Peters
Keyword(s):  
Older Adults ◽  
Decision Making ◽  
Inhibitory Control ◽  
Flanker Task ◽  
Adult Males ◽  
Risky Decision ◽  
Younger Adults ◽  
Attentional Processes ◽  
Main Effect ◽  
Comparable Accuracy

Understanding how older adults successfully navigate complex choices like driving requires the consideration of processing speed, inhibitory control, attentional processes, and risk management, and the context within which these decisions occur. The current study employed the Flanker task, the Stoplight task, and a personality inventory with 43 younger adults and 49 older adults either while they were alone or being observed by two same-sex, similarly aged peers. On the Flanker task, older adults performed more slowly, but with comparable accuracy. On the Stoplight task, there was a significant main effect of Context, and an Age-Group by Sex interaction, even after controlling for response time: All groups had a greater number of crashes when alone, and young adult males had significantly more crashes than any other group. These results emphasize the importance of considering the broader context of decision-making.

scholarly journals Normal Aging Delays and Compromises Early Multifocal Visual Attention during Object Tracking

2013 ◽  
Vol 25 (2) ◽  
pp. 188-202 ◽  
Author(s):  
Viola S. Störmer ◽  
Shu-Chen Li ◽  
Hauke R. Heekeren ◽  
Ulman Lindenberger
Keyword(s):  
Older Adults ◽  
Visual Attention ◽  
Object Tracking ◽  
Visual Processing ◽  
Normal Aging ◽  
Multiple Object Tracking ◽  
Attentional Modulation ◽  
Younger Adults ◽  
Multiple Object ◽  
Age Related

Declines in selective attention are one of the sources contributing to age-related impairments in a broad range of cognitive functions. Most previous research on mechanisms underlying older adults' selection deficits has studied the deployment of visual attention to static objects and features. Here we investigate neural correlates of age-related differences in spatial attention to multiple objects as they move. We used a multiple object tracking task, in which younger and older adults were asked to keep track of moving target objects that moved randomly in the visual field among irrelevant distractor objects. By recording the brain's electrophysiological responses during the tracking period, we were able to delineate neural processing for targets and distractors at early stages of visual processing (∼100–300 msec). Older adults showed less selective attentional modulation in the early phase of the visual P1 component (100–125 msec) than younger adults, indicating that early selection is compromised in old age. However, with a 25-msec delay relative to younger adults, older adults showed distinct processing of targets (125–150 msec), that is, a delayed yet intact attentional modulation. The magnitude of this delayed attentional modulation was related to tracking performance in older adults. The amplitude of the N1 component (175–210 msec) was smaller in older adults than in younger adults, and the target amplification effect of this component was also smaller in older relative to younger adults. Overall, these results indicate that normal aging affects the efficiency and timing of early visual processing during multiple object tracking.

Aging and Haptic-Visual Solid Shape Matching

Perception ◽  
2017 ◽  
Vol 46 (8) ◽  
pp. 976-986 ◽  
Author(s):  
J. Farley Norman ◽  
Olivia C. Adkins ◽  
Catherine J. Dowell ◽  
Stevie C. Hoyng ◽  
Ashley N. Gilliam ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Older Adults ◽  
Shape Matching ◽  
Younger Adults ◽  
Haptic Exploration ◽  
Single Finger ◽  
Main Effect ◽  
Bell Peppers ◽  
Matching Performance ◽  
Object Shapes ◽  
The One

A total of 36 younger (mean age = 21.3 years) and older adults (mean age = 73.8 years) haptically explored plastic copies of naturally shaped objects (bell peppers, Capsicum annuum) one at a time for 7 s each. The participants’ task was to then choose which of 12 concurrently visible objects had the same solid shape as the one they felt. The younger and older participants explored the object shapes using either one, three, or five fingers (there were six participants for each combination of number of fingers and age group). The outcome was different from that of previous research conducted with manmade objects. Unlike Jansson and Monaci (2006) , we found that for most objects, our participants’ performance was unaffected by variations in the number of fingers used for haptic exploration. While there was no significant overall effect of the number of fingers, there was a significant main effect of age. The younger adults’ shape matching performance was 48.6% higher than that of the older adults. When perceiving naturally shaped objects such as bell peppers, it appears that the usage of a single finger can be as effective as haptic exploration with a whole complement of five fingers.

scholarly journals Word Retrieval Failures in Old Age: The Relationship between Structure and Function

2010 ◽  
Vol 22 (7) ◽  
pp. 1530-1540 ◽  
Author(s):  
Meredith A. Shafto ◽  
Emmanuel A. Stamatakis ◽  
Phyllis P. Tam ◽  
L. K. Tyler
Keyword(s):  
Older Adults ◽  
Old Age ◽  
Gray Matter ◽  
Normal Aging ◽  
Word Retrieval ◽  
Younger Adults ◽  
Word Finding ◽  
Age Related ◽  
Tip Of The Tongue ◽  
Left Insula

A common complaint of normal aging is the increase in word-finding failures such as tip-of-the-tongue states (TOTs). Behavioral research identifies TOTs as phonological retrieval failures, and recent findings [Shafto, M. A., Burke, D. M., Stamatakis, E. A., Tam, P., & Tyler, L. K. On the tip-of-the-tongue: Neural correlates of increased word-finding failures in normal aging. Journal of Cognitive Neuroscience, 19, 2060–2070, 2007] link age-related increases in TOTs to atrophy in left insula, a region implicated in phonological production. Here, younger and older adults performed a picture naming task in the fMRI scanner. During successful naming, left insula activity was not affected by age or gray matter integrity. Age differences only emerged during TOTs, with younger but not older adults generating a “boost” of activity during TOTs compared to successful naming. Older adults also had less activity than younger adults during TOTs compared to “don't know” responses, and across all participants, less TOT activity was affiliated with lower gray matter density. For older adults, lower levels of activity during TOTs accompanied higher TOT rates, supporting the role of an age-related neural mechanism impacting older more than younger adults. Results support a neural account of word retrieval in old age wherein, despite widespread age-related atrophy, word production processes are not universally impacted by age. However, atrophy undermines older adults' ability to modulate neural responses needed to overcome retrieval failures.

scholarly journals Dedifferentiation of caudate functional connectivity and striatal dopamine transporter density predict memory change in normal aging

2018 ◽  
Vol 115 (40) ◽  
pp. 10160-10165 ◽  
Author(s):  
Anna Rieckmann ◽  
Keith A. Johnson ◽  
Reisa A. Sperling ◽  
Randy L. Buckner ◽  
Trey Hedden
Keyword(s):  
Older Adults ◽  
Functional Connectivity ◽  
Dopamine Transporter ◽  
Normal Aging ◽  
Striatal Dopamine ◽  
Functional Coupling ◽  
Younger Adults ◽  
Memory Decline ◽  
Age Related ◽  
Striatal Function

Age-related changes in striatal function are potentially important for predicting declining memory performance over the adult life span. Here, we used fMRI to measure functional connectivity of caudate subfields with large-scale association networks and positron emission tomography to measure striatal dopamine transporter (DAT) density in 51 older adults (age 65–86 years) who received annual cognitive testing for up to 7 years (mean = 5.59, range 2–7 years). Analyses showed that cortical–caudate functional connectivity was less differentiated in older compared with younger adults (n= 63, age 18–32 years). Unlike in younger adults, the central lateral caudate was less strongly coupled with the frontal parietal control network in older adults. Older adults also showed less “decoupling” of the caudate from other networks, including areas of the default network (DN) and the hippocampal complex. Contrary to expectations, less decoupling between caudate and the DN was not associated with an age-related reduction of striatal DAT, suggesting that neurobiological changes in the cortex may drive dedifferentiation of cortical–caudate connectivity. Reduction of specificity in functional coupling between caudate and regions of the DN predicted memory decline over subsequent years at older ages. The age-related reduction in striatal DAT density also predicted memory decline, suggesting that a relation between striatal functions and memory decline in aging is multifaceted. Collectively, the study provides evidence highlighting the association of age-related differences in striatal function to memory decline in normal aging.

scholarly journals Association with Temperature Variability and Physical Activity, Sedentary Behavior, and Sleep in a Free-Living Population

2021 ◽  
Vol 18 (24) ◽  
pp. 13077
Author(s):  
Jeong-Hui Park ◽  
Youngwon Kim ◽  
Gregory J. Welk ◽  
Pedro Silva ◽  
Jung-Min Lee
Keyword(s):  
Physical Activity ◽  
Older Adults ◽  
Sedentary Behavior ◽  
Temperature Variability ◽  
Climate Classification ◽  
Free Living ◽  
Younger Adults ◽  
Main Effect ◽  
The Impact ◽  
Surveillance Applications

The present study examines the temperature variability in physical activity (PA), sedentary behavior (SB), and sleep in a free-living population. A representative sample of 1235 adults (ages 21–70) from Iowa, U.S.A., wore a SenseWear Mini Armband (SWA) for a randomly assigned day. Koppen’s weather climate classification was used to precisely classify the temperature: cold (−13 to 32 °F), cool (32 to 50 °F), mild (50 to 64 °F), warm (64 to 73 °F), and hot (73 to 95 °F). The main effect of three-way ANOVA (age × gender × temperature) had differences for SB and sleep, with older adults having higher levels than younger adults (p < 0.05). However, moderate to vigorous PA (MVPA) did not vary systematically by age or gender, and contrary to expectations, the main effect of the weather was not significant for MVPA (p > 0.05). Participants spent more time participating in PA at cold than at hot temperatures. The results clarify the impact of temperature on shaping PA and SB patterns in adults. The variable impacts and differential patterns by age suggest that weather should be considered when interpreting differences in PA patterns in research or surveillance applications.

Cognitive Load Affects Speech Motor Performance Differently in Older and Younger Adults

2019 ◽  
Vol 62 (5) ◽  
pp. 1258-1277 ◽  
Author(s):  
Megan K. MacPherson
Keyword(s):  
Older Adults ◽  
Cognitive Load ◽  
Motor Performance ◽  
Age Groups ◽  
Incongruent Condition ◽  
Sentence Production ◽  
Movement Duration ◽  
Production Task ◽  
Younger Adults ◽  
Speech Motor

PurposeThe aim of this study was to determine the impact of cognitive load imposed by a speech production task on the speech motor performance of healthy older and younger adults. Response inhibition, selective attention, and working memory were the primary cognitive processes of interest.MethodTwelve healthy older and 12 healthy younger adults produced multiple repetitions of 4 sentences containing an embedded Stroop task in 2 cognitive load conditions: congruent and incongruent. The incongruent condition, which required participants to suppress orthographic information to say the font colors in which color words were written, represented an increase in cognitive load relative to the congruent condition in which word text and font color matched. Kinematic measures of articulatory coordination variability and movement duration as well as a behavioral measure of sentence production accuracy were compared between groups and conditions and across 3 sentence segments (pre-, during-, and post-Stroop).ResultsIncreased cognitive load in the incongruent condition was associated with increased articulatory coordination variability and movement duration, compared to the congruent Stroop condition, for both age groups. Overall, the effect of increased cognitive load was greater for older adults than younger adults and was greatest in the portion of the sentence in which cognitive load was manipulated (during-Stroop), followed by the pre-Stroop segment. Sentence production accuracy was reduced for older adults in the incongruent condition.ConclusionsIncreased cognitive load involving response inhibition, selective attention, and working memory processes within a speech production task disrupted both the stability and timing with which speech was produced by both age groups. Older adults' speech motor performance may have been more affected due to age-related changes in cognitive and motoric functions that result in altered motor cognition.

Regulation of Experienced and Anticipated Regret for Daily Decisions in Younger and Older Adults in a Swedish One-Week Diary Study

GeroPsych ◽  
2013 ◽  
Vol 26 (4) ◽  
pp. 233-241 ◽  
Author(s):  
Pär Bjälkebring ◽  
Daniel Västfjäll ◽  
Boo Johansson
Keyword(s):  
Older Adults ◽  
Diary Study ◽  
Anticipated Regret ◽  
Younger Adults ◽  
Web Based ◽  
Decision Regret ◽  
Diary Method ◽  
Regulation Strategies

Regret and regret regulation were studied using a weeklong web-based diary method. 108 participants aged 19 to 89 years reported regret for a decision made and a decision to be made. They also reported the extent to which they used strategies to prevent or regulate decision regret. Older adults reported both less experienced and anticipated regret compared to younger adults. The lower level of experienced regret in older adults was mediated by reappraisal of the decision. The lower level of anticipated regret was mediated by delaying the decision, and expecting regret in older adults. It is suggested that the lower level of regret observed in older adults is partly explained by regret prevention and regulation strategies.

Video Games and Emotion Regulation

GeroPsych ◽  
2018 ◽  
Vol 31 (4) ◽  
pp. 205-213 ◽  
Author(s):  
Kathryn L. Ossenfort ◽  
Derek M. Isaacowitz
Keyword(s):  
Older Adults ◽  
Emotion Regulation ◽  
Video Games ◽  
Age Differences ◽  
Interactive Media ◽  
Age Groups ◽  
Younger Adults ◽  
Media Usage ◽  
The Everyday ◽  
Media Preferences

Abstract. Research on age differences in media usage has shown that older adults are more likely than younger adults to select positive emotional content. Research on emotional aging has examined whether older adults also seek out positivity in the everyday situations they choose, resulting so far in mixed results. We investigated the emotional choices of different age groups using video games as a more interactive type of affect-laden stimuli. Participants made multiple selections from a group of positive and negative games. Results showed that older adults selected the more positive games, but also reported feeling worse after playing them. Results supplement the literature on positivity in situation selection as well as on older adults’ interactive media preferences.

Sign in / Sign up

Export Citation Format

Share Document