Adult age differences in memory for motor versus cognitive activities

Short article: Encoding in verbal, enacted and autobiographical tasks in young and older adults

Young and older adults participated in a task in which they were asked to say items printed on a card out loud (verbal condition), act out a command printed on a card (enactment condition), and retrieve memories associated with a theme or action printed on a card (autobiographical encoding condition). The results indicate that items in the subject-performed task and autobiographical memory condition were remembered equally well, and both were remembered better than verbal stimuli. Age differences were absent in the verbal condition, but present in both the enactment condition and the autobiographical encoding condition. We discuss the results in the context of earlier findings demonstrating a subject-performed task advantage in mixed-presentation lists (Engelkamp & Zimmer, 1997) and age differences in enactment tasks (Kausler & Lichty, 1982).

Memory for activities for young, young-old, and old adults

Adult age differences in memory for activities have frequently been reported. However, the age range of the older sample has varied from as young as 56 to as old as 89. The present memory for activities study distinguished between the performance of young-old adults (60 to 70) and old adults (71 to 82) in comparison to young adults (18 to 34). Nineteen tasks were administered over a 2-day period, and individuals were asked to recall them immediately or after a 24-h delay. Young-old adults' memory for activities was comparable to the young adults' for both immediate and delayed recall. Both the young and the young-old groups outperformed the old adults. The results suggest that researchers must consider the age of the individuals in the "old" group before drawing conclusions about adult age differences in memory for activities.

Age differences in the recall of actions and cognitive activities: the effects of presentation rate and object cues

In studies of activity memory, age differences have been found in the recall of cognitive activities (sustained mental activities that subjects solve during acquisition) but not in recall of Subject-Performed Tasks (one-step actions that subjects enact during acquisition). To understand the reasons for the discrepant findings, both types of item were included in a study examining the effects of object cues, rate of presentation, and aging. Variations in presentation rate or use of objects did not account for the different findings on the two item types. Even when presentation rate and object cues were matched, larger age differences were found for recall of cognitive activities than of SPTs. Age differences were also affected by the interaction of item type, presentation rate, and the presence of objects during encoding. To identify the variables controlling age differences, more analysis is needed of the features of activities to be remembered.

Temporal memory and content memory for actions: adult age differences in acquisition and retention

Young adult and elderly adult subjects were tested under incidental memory conditions for recognition memory of content and temporal memory for the order of a series of actions performed in the laboratory. The tests were conducted both shortly after completion of the series and 24 hours later, with different sets of actions tested on each occasion. Recognition memory of content showed no forgetting for the young subjects, but significant forgetting for the elderly subjects. Memory for temporal information was substantially greater for the young subjects than for the elderly subjects. Both age groups showed substantial forgetting of temporal information over the 24-hour retention interval.

Glucose enhancement of performance on memory tests in young and aged humans

Recent findings indicate that glucose administration enhances memory processes in rodents. This study examined the effects of glucose on memory in humans. After drinking glucose- or saccharin-flavored beverages, college-aged and elderly humans were tested with modified versions of the Wechsler Memory Scale. Beverages and tests were administered in a counter-balanced, crossover design, enabling within subject comparisons. The major findings were: (1) glucose enhanced memory in elderly and, to a lesser extent, in young subjects; and (2) glucose tolerance in individual subjects predicted memory in elderly, but not in young subjects on both glucose and saccharin test days.

Instructional variation and adult age differences in activity memory

Recall of a series of 12 activities was compared for young and elderly subjects performing under four instructional conditions: incidental memory, standard intentional memory, intentional-emphasis, and interpolated recall (intermediate recall tests after every three activities had been performed). Relative to the incidental memory condition, superior recall was found for subjects in the intentional-emphasis and intentional-interpolated recall conditions. An age-related deficit in recall was found, but the Age X Instructional Condition interaction was not significant. Instructional variation was also found to affect temporal memory scores for the order in which the activities has been performed. An age-related deficit in temporal memory proficiency was found for all conditions except that of interpolated recall. On the other hand, instructional variation had a negligible effect on performance scores for the 12 specific activities.