Age-Related Changes in the use of Study Context to Increase Recollection

Abstract

We examined how context presented at study affects recollection of words in younger and older adults. In Experiment 1, participants studied words presented with a picture of a face (context-rich condition) or a rectangle (context-weak condition), and subsequently made 'Remember', 'Know', or 'New' judgments to words presented alone. Younger, but not older, adults showed higher Remember accuracy following rich- than weak-context trials. In Experiment 2, we manipulated the type of processing engaged during the encoding of context-word pairs. Younger and older adults studied words presented with a picture of a face under a surface feature (gender) or binding feature (match) instruction condition. Both age groups showed higher Remember accuracy in the binding than surface instruction condition. Results suggest that providing rich contextual detail at encoding boosts later item recollection in younger adults. Older adults, however, do not spontaneously engage in the processes required to boost recollection, though instructional manipulation during encoding lessens this deficit.

Reading the news on Twitter: Source and item memory for social media in younger and older adults

“…For example, Staresina, Gray, and Davachi (2009) found that congruent items resulted in better memory for items and item-colors relative to incongruent items. However, if such congruency effects depend on effortful encoding strategies or attentional resources, older adults, who show deficits in self-initiated strategy use (Craik & Byrd, 1982;Skinner & Fernandes, 2009), might be less likely to use such factors. Indeed, older adults need additional environmental support to engage in more effortful strategies (Hay & Jacoby, 1999).…”

The Effects of Healthy Aging, Amnestic Mild Cognitive Impairment, and Alzheimer’s Disease on Recollection and Familiarity: A Meta-Analytic Review

“…Across 49 published papers, we identified 68 independent comparisons of young and older adults (see Table 1). We treated each experiment in a multiple-experiment report as an independent observation when a new sample of participants were recruited (e.g., Healy et al 2005; Jennings and Jacoby 1993; Luo et al 2007; McCabe and Geraci 2009; Parks 2007; Skinner and Fernandes 2009a). Likewise, experiments that employed a between-subject manipulation crossed with age were treated as providing two independent observations (e.g., McCabe and Geraci 2009; Toth and Parks 2006).…”

“…We made this distinction based on the types of materials used during the test phase. For example, a study that included words paired with a picture (Luo et al 2007) or a face (Skinner and Fernandes 2009a), but only tested memory of the words was coded as a study using verbal materials. The type of nonverbal materials used in the studies included in the effect size analysis included travel scenes (Düzel et al 2011; Howard et al 2006), objects (Angel et al 2013; Duarte et al 2006), and symbols (Friedman et al 2010).…”

On the particular vulnerability of face recognition to aging: a review of three hypotheses

“…It would be interesting for follow-up studies to employ these techniques in a recognition task to test whether faces with greater similarity yield more false alarms in older adults. It might also be possible to combine morphing techniques with experimental manipulations borrowed from studies on source memory (e.g., Brown et al, 1995 ; Skinner and Fernandes, 2009 ; Rahhal et al, 2002 ; Luo et al, 2007 ) to examine if manipulations of the context under which a face was viewed has a differential impact on younger and older adults. Finally, because face recognition deficits in older adults have deleterious implications for eyewitness testimonies, further investigations into techniques that could improve recollecting contextual information via cues to source memories are worth pursuing.…”