Task Coordination Skill: The Effects of Age and Training Type in Relationship Integration

Abstract

Throughout the lifespan, humans need to understand complex relationships between environmental cues. These may be perceptual-motor cues, such as operating an input device, or cognitively oriented, such as understanding how exercise and food intake affect and interact with the body's blood sugar level. Past research has shown age-related differences in the ability to integrate cues: younger adults integrate related task components better than unrelated components while older adults perform the same for low and high relatedness (Korteling, 1991(Korteling, , 1993. What remains to be discovered is whether different types of training affect performance with different amounts of cue relation. Our prediction is that augmenting relationships of the cues during task will produce higher performance when task cues are interrelated. Simplifying the task (showing fewer relationships at one time) will produce higher performance when the cues are unrelated. We expect to uncover age-related differences for conditions when task and training type are mismatched. The results of this study should provide insight into cognitive skill acquisition and appropriate training methods for older adults.