See no evil: Attentional bias toward threat is diminished in aged monkeys

Prior evidence demonstrates that relative to younger adults, older human adults exhibit attentional biases toward positive and/or away from negative socioaffective stimuli (i.e., the age-related positivity effect). Whether or not the effect is phylogenetically conserved is currently unknown and its biopsychosocial origins are debated. To address this gap, we evaluated how visual processing of socioaffective stimuli differs in aged, compared to middle-aged, rhesus monkeys (Macaca mulatta) using eye tracking in two experimental designs that are directly comparable to those historically used for evaluating attentional biases in humans. Results of our study demonstrate that while younger rhesus possesses robust attentional biases toward threatening pictures of conspecifics' faces, aged animals evidence no such bias. Critically, these biases emerged only when threatening faces were paired with neutral and not ostensibly "positive" faces, suggesting social context modifies the effect. Results of our study suggest that the evolutionarily shared mechanisms drive age-related decline in visual biases toward negative stimuli in aging across primate species. (PsycInfo Database Record (c) 2024 APA, all rights reserved).

Age-related positivity effect in emotional memory consolidation from middle age to late adulthood

Background

While younger adults are more likely to attend to, process, and remember negative relative to positive information, healthy older adults show the opposite pattern. The current study evaluates when, exactly, this positivity shift begins, and how it influences memory performance for positive, negative, and neutral information.

Methods

A total of 274 healthy early middle-aged (35-47), late middle-aged (48-59), and older adults (>59) viewed scenes consisting of a negative, positive, or a neutral object placed on a plausible neutral background, and rated each scene for its valence and arousal. After 12 h spanning a night of sleep (n = 137) or a day of wakefulness (n = 137), participants completed an unexpected memory test during which they were shown objects and backgrounds separately and indicated whether the scene component was the "same," "similar," or "new" to what they viewed during the study session.

Results and conclusions

We found that both late middle-aged and older adults rated positive and neutral scenes more positively compared to early middle-aged adults. However, only older adults showed better memory for positive objects relative to negative objects, and a greater positive memory trade-off magnitude (i.e., remembering positive objects at the cost of their associated neutral backgrounds) than negative memory trade-off magnitude (i.e., remembering negative objects at the cost of their associated neutral backgrounds). Our findings suggest that while the positivity bias may not emerge in memory until older adulthood, a shift toward positivity in terms of processing may begin in middle age.

Younger and older adults' memory of past feelings surrounding an election

People often misremember their past feelings, especially when recalling their prior mood as opposed to their specific emotions in response to events. A previous study also found that the direction of memory errors varies based on feeling type; younger adults overestimated the intensity of prior moods but underestimated the intensity of prior event-specific emotions. This study aimed to replicate these patterns and test whether they vary with age. In doing so, we also tested whether an age-related positivity effect would emerge, such that older adults would be relatively more likely to overestimate past positive feelings and underestimate past negative feelings. Using a sample of American voters, who reported their feelings following the 2020 United States presidential election, we found that both younger and older adults subsequently overestimated the intensity of their past mood in the week following the election but were relatively accurate in recalling the intensity of their prior emotions about the election result. Unexpectedly, among election losers, we also observed an age-related negativity effect in recall for prior mood. When faced with negative real-world events, older adults may not show the same positivity biases that are observed in lab studies.

Corrigendum: Age-related differences in affective norms for Chinese words (AANC)

[This corrects the article DOI: 10.3389/fpsyg.2021.585666.].

Is there an emotionality effect in older adults' source memory?

The goal of our research was to investigate whether older adults show a source memory enhancement for emotionally valenced sources. Additionally, building on research on the socioemotional selectivity theory and the age-related positivity effect, we tested whether older adults show a larger enhancement for positive compared to negative (and neutral) sources than younger adults. In Experiment 1 (nold = 25, nyoung = 27), we used one positive, one negative, and one neutral picture to manipulate source valence (many-to-one mapping of items to sources), whereas, in Experiment 2 (nold = 62, nyoung = 62), we used multiple pictures per source valence category (one-to-one mapping of items to sources) to counteract potential habituation effects. In both experiments, sources had medium and matching arousal levels. Items were neutral words superimposed on the source pictures. To support an implicit, natural information processing, participants rated the words in terms of pleasantness. We analyzed memory data with a multinomial processing tree model to disentangle memory processes from guessing bias. Across both experiments, an age-related positivity effect occurred in participants' pleasantness ratings. This effect, however, did not carry over to older adults' source memory. That is, in source memory, we found a general emotionality effect for younger but not for older adults and no age-related positivity effect. We propose that due to older adults' pronounced difficulties in remembering the item-to-source link (i.e., associative deficit), even a greater focus on an inherently emotional source might be insufficient to boost source memory.

Age-related intrinsic functional connectivity underlying emotion utilization

Previous studies investigated the age-related positivity effect in terms of emotion perception and management, whereas little is known about whether the positivity effect is shown in emotion utilization (EU). If yes, the EU-related intrinsic functional connectivity and its age-associated alterations remain to be elucidated. In this study, we collected resting-state functional magnetic resonance imaging data from 62 healthy older adults and 72 undergraduates as well as their self-ratings of EU. By using the connectome-based predictive modeling (CPM) method, we constructed a predictive model of the positive relationship between EU self-ratings and resting-state functional connectivity. Lesion simulation analyses revealed that the medial-frontal network, default mode network, frontoparietal network, and subcortical regions played key roles in the EU-related CPM. Older subjects showed significantly higher EU self-ratings than undergraduates, which was associated with strengthened connectivity between the left dorsolateral prefrontal cortex and bilateral frontal poles, and between the left frontal pole and thalamus. A mediation analysis indicated that the age-related EU network mediated the age effect on EU self-ratings. Our findings extend previous research on the age-related "positivity effect" to the EU domain, suggesting that the positivity effect on the self-evaluation of EU is probably associated with emotion knowledge which accumulates with age.

With age comes well-being: older age associated with lower stress, negative affect, and depression throughout the COVID-19 pandemic

Objectives: Despite initial concerns about older adult's emotional well-being during the COVID-19 pandemic, reports from the first months of the pandemic suggested that older adults were faring better than younger adults, reporting lower stress, negative affect, depression, and anxiety. In this study, we examined whether this pattern would persist as the pandemic progressed.Method: A convenience sample of 1,171 community-dwelling adults in the United States, ages 18-90, filled out surveys on various metrics of emotional well-being starting in March 2020 and at various time points through April 2021. We created time bins to account for the occurrence of significant national events, allowing us to determine how age would relate to affective outcomes when additional national-level emotional events were overlaid upon the stress of the pandemic.Results: Older age was associated with lower stress, negative affect, and depressive symptomatology, and with higher positive affect, and this effect was consistent across time points measured from March, 2020 through April, 2021. Age was less associated with measures of worry and social isolation, but older adults were more worried about their personal health throughout the pandemic.Conclusion: These results are consistent with literature suggesting that older age is associated with increased resilience in the face of stressful life experiences and show that this pattern may extend to resilience in the face of a prolonged real-world stressor.Supplemental data for this article can be accessed online at https://doi.org/10.1080/13607863.2021.2010183 .

The Protective Role of Neurogenetic Components in Reducing Stress-Related Effects during Spaceflights: Evidence from the Age-Related Positive Memory Approach

Fighting stress-related effects during spaceflight is crucial for a successful mission. Emotional, motivational, and cognitive mechanisms have already been shown to be involved in the decrease of negative emotions. However, emerging evidence is pointing to a neurogenetic profile that may render some individuals more prone than others to focusing on positive information in memory and increasing affective health. The relevance for adaptation to the space environment and the interaction with other stressors such as ionizing radiations is discussed. In particular, to clarify this approach better, we will draw from the psychology and aging literature data. Subsequently, we report on studies on candidate genes for sensitivity to positive memories. We review work on the following candidate genes that may be crucial in adaptation mechanisms: ADRA2B, COMT, 5HTTLPR, CB1, and TOMM40. The final aim is to show how the study of genetics and cell biology of positive memory can help us to reveal the underlying bottom-up pathways to also increasing positive effects during a space mission.

Age-differences in interpreting the valence of ambiguous facial expressions: evidence for multiple contributing processes

Surprised facial expressions, which are ambiguous in valence, are interpreted more positively by older adults than by younger adults. To evaluate the processes contributing to this age difference, we varied the spatial frequency of the surprised-face stimuli. When faces were presented in a low-spatial-frequency band, it biased participants to rate them negatively. Although this occurred for both younger and older adults, the older adults' ratings of the low-spatial-frequency faces were more positive than that of the younger adults. This suggests that there is an age-related reduction in the default negativity of interpretations. We also found that older adults, as a whole, rated the high-spatial-frequency faces more positively than did younger adults. However, this effect was eliminated for the subset of older adults with poor high-spatial-frequency perception abilities for whom these faces were difficult to perceive. Thus, older adults' more positive interpretations of surprised faces may also reflect cognitively-effortful regulatory processes.

"When did you see it?" The effect of emotional valence on temporal source memory in aging

Previous studies consistently showed age-related differences in temporal judgment and temporal memory. Importantly, emotional valence plays a crucial role in older adults' information processing. In this study, we examined the effects of emotions at the intersection between time and memory, analysing age-related differences in a temporal source memory task. Twenty-five younger adults (age range 18-35), 25 old adults (age range 65-74), and 25 old-old adults (age range 75-84) saw a series of emotional pictures in three sessions separated by a one-day rest period. In the fourth session, participants were asked to indicate in which session (1, 2, or 3) they saw each picture. Results showed that old-old adults tended to collocate negative pictures distant in time, while positive stimuli were remembered as more recent than real, compared to neutral pictures. To a lower extent, people over 65 showed the same pattern of results. In contrast, emotional valence did not affect younger adults' temporal positioning of stimuli. Current findings fit well with the Socio-Emotional Selectivity Theory's assumptions and extended the literature on the positivity effect to temporal source memory.

Do Older and Younger Adults Prefer the Positive or Avoid the Negative?

Affective information is processed in different ways across one's lifespan. Explanations for this pattern of performance are multiple and range from top-down motivational shifts and cognitive control to faster bottom-up and implicit processes. In this study, we aimed to investigate implicit affective information processing and positivity effects by examining performance in a modified version of the dot-probe task across three image-pair conditions (positive/neutral; negative/neutral; and positive/negative). We examined data from 50 older adults and 50 younger adults. The results showed that affective information processing varies with age and valence and that age effects in affective processing may occur early during information processing. Positivity biases emerge in both younger and older adults. However, while younger adults seem to prioritize positive information independently of context, older adults showed this prioritization only when presented in an emotional (i.e., negative) context. Moreover, older adults showed a tendency to avoid negative information whereas younger adults showed a general bias for affective content modulated by image-pair context.

The age-related positivity effect: forgetting the negative and/or remembering the positive? An inter-task study

A growing number of studies have shown that when compared to younger adults, older adults are better at recalling positive information than negative information. However, it is not yet clear whether this age-related positivity effect relies on a greater ability to recall positive information or on a decreased ability to recall negative information. We therefore aimed to study the specific mechanisms underlying the age-related positivity effect using different memory tasks. We used an emotional word memory paradigm including immediate free recall, recognition, and delayed free recall tasks. Forty-five young adults (m = 20.0 years) and 45 older adults (m = 69.2 years) participated, all of whom were native French speakers. Thirty-six French low-arousal words (12 positve, 12, negative, 12 neutral) were selected from an emotional lexical database (Gobin et al. 2017) and divided into three equal groups of positive, neutral and negative terms. For the recognition task, 36 new words were selected. The results show that the age-related positivity effect specifically depended on a decrease in negativity preference (i.e., the comparison between negative and neutral words) in older adults, in comparison with younger adults, both in the immediate and delayed free recall tasks. In these tasks, younger adults recalled more negative than neutral words, whereas there was no difference in older adults. During the recognition task, no age-related positivity effect was observed. The results also show that, for the immediate recall task, the greater the memory ability of older adults, the lower their negativity preference. This correlation was not significant in the delayed recall task. These results suggest that, when compared with younger adults, older adults disengage from processing negative words that require costly cognitive processes. A low negativity preference indicates that memory abilities are well-maintained. The results are discussed within the framework of socio-emotional selectivity theory.

Prospective Memory and Positivity Bias in the COVID-19 Health Crisis: The Effects of Aging

This study aimed to determine whether the observed tendency to remember more positive than negative past events (positivity phenomena) also appears when recalling hypothetical events about the future. In this study, young, middle-aged, and older adults were presented with 28 statements about the future associated with the COVID-19 pandemic, half positive and half negative. In addition, half of these statements were endowed with personal implications while the other half had a more social connotations. Participants rated their agreement/disagreement with each statement and, after a distraction task, they recalled as many statements as possible. There was no difference in the agreement ratings between the three age groups, but the participants agreed with positive statements more than with negative ones and they identified more with statements of social content than of personal content. The younger and older individuals recalled more statements than the middle-aged people. More importantly, older participants recalled more positive than negative statements (positivity effect), and showed a greater tendency to turn negative statements into more positive or neutral ones (positivity bias). These findings showed that the positivity effect occurs in even such complex and situations as the present pandemic, especially in older adults. The results are discussed by reference to the notion of commission errors and false memories resulting from the activation of cognitive biases.

Viewing time and facial trustworthiness perception: Giving it a second thought may not work for older adults

Older adults tend to rate unfamiliar faces higher on trustworthiness than do their younger counterparts. Although the saying goes "look before you leap", it is still unknown whether such a strategy could also apply to facial trustworthiness perception, and our understanding of the time course in facial trustworthiness perception also remains unclear. Here, we have argued that a cognitive controlled process suggested by "socioemotional selectivity theory" could potentially lead to such biased trustworthiness perception. Two experiments were conducted to test the association between viewing time and trustworthiness perception. The first study used hierarchical linear modeling in a sample of younger (N = 30, M_age  = 20.53, SD = 1.61, 50% female) and older (N = 30, M_age  = 63.27, SD = 3.14, 43% female) adults, and found that viewing time and trustworthiness evaluation were positively associated. Using the same stimuli, our second study further manipulated viewing time by two levels (500 ms vs. 3000 ms) and compared younger (N = 28, M_age  = 23.93, SD = 2.68, 50% female) and older (N = 30, M_age  = 64.47, SD = 4.32, 50% female) adults' facial trustworthiness evaluation. As expected, a significant three-way interaction revealed that viewing time only impacted older adults' facial trustworthiness evaluation, and only when given shorter viewing time did older adults show similar facial trustworthiness ratings as younger adults. The present study is the first to directly investigate the relationship between older adults' viewing time on unfamiliar faces and their perception of facial trustworthiness. Findings suggested that a second thought in facial perception may not benefit older adults' trustworthiness evaluation.

Effect of Cognitive Control on Attentional Processing of Emotional Information Among Older Adults: Evidence From an Eye-Tracking Study

Background: Although numerous studies have suggested that the gradually increasing selective preference for positive information over negative information in older adults depends on cognitive control processes, few have reported the characteristics of different attention stages in the emotional processing of older individuals. The present study used a real-time eye-tracking technique to disentangle the attentional engagement and disengagement processes involved in age-related positivity effect (PE). Methods: Eye movement data from a spatial-cueing task were obtained for 32 older and 32 younger healthy participants. The spatial-cueing task with varied cognitive loads appeared to be an effective way to explore the role of cognitive control during the attention engagement and disengagement stages of emotion processing. Results: Compared with younger adults, older participants showed more positive gaze preferences when cognitive resources were sufficient for face processing at the attention engagement stage. However, the age-related PE was not observed at the attention disengagement stage because older adults had more difficulty disengaging from fearful faces than did the younger adults due to the consumption of attention by the explicit target judgment. Conclusion: The present study highlights how cognitive control moderates positive gaze preferences at different attention processing stages. These findings may have far-reaching implications for understanding, preventing, and intervening in unsuccessful aging and, thus, in promoting active and healthy aging.

Age-Related Differences in Affective Norms for Chinese Words (AANC)

Information on age-related differences in affective meanings of words is widely used by researchers to study emotions, word recognition, attention, memory, and text-based sentiment analysis. To date, no Chinese affective norms for older adults are available although Chinese as a spoken language has the largest population in the world. This article presents the first large-scale age-related affective norms for 2,061 four-character Chinese words (AANC). Each word in this database has rating values in the four dimensions, namely, valence, arousal, dominance, and familiarity. We found that older adults tended to perceive positive words as more arousing and less controllable and evaluate negative words as less arousing and more controllable than younger adults did. This indicates that the positivity effect is reliable for older adults who show a processing bias toward positive vs. negative words. Our AANC database supplies valuable information for researchers to study how emotional characteristics of words influence the cognitive processes and how this influence evolves with age. This age-related difference study on affective norms not only provides a tool for cognitive science, gerontology, and psychology in experimental studies but also serves as a valuable resource for affective analysis in various natural language processing applications.

[The age-related positivity effect: forgetting the negative and/or remembering the positive? An inter-task study]

A growing number of studies have shown that, compared to young adults, older adults better remember positive information than negative information. However, it is not clear whether this age-related positivity effect relies on an increase in positive information memory and/or on a decrease in negative information memory. Thus, we aimed to study the specific mechanisms underlying the age-related positivity effect in different memory tasks. To do so, we used an emotional word memory paradigm including immediate free recall, recognition and delayed free recall tasks. Forty-five young adults (m = 20.0 years) and 45 older adults (m = 69.2 years) native French speakers participated. Thirty-six low French words, including 12 negative (e.g. égout), 12 positive (e.g. lagune) and 12 neutral (e.g. notion) words were selected from an emotional lexical database (Gobin et al. 2017). For the recognition task, 36 new words were selected. The results showed that the age-related positivity effect specifically depended on a decrease in negativity preference (i.e. the comparison between negative and neutral words) in older adults, in comparison with young adults, both in immediate and delayed free recall tasks. Indeed, in these tasks, young adults recalled more negative than neutral words whereas there was no difference in older adults. In recognition task, no age-related positivity effect has been observed. Moreover, the results showed that, in immediate recall, the higher the older adults memory abilities, the lower their negativity preference. This correlation was not significant in delayed recall. These results suggest that, when compared with young adults, older adults disengage from negative words processing through costly cognitive processes. A small magnitude of negativity preference would indicate good maintenance of memory abilities. Results are discussed in the framework of the socioemotional selectivity theory.

Positivity in Younger and in Older Age: Associations With Future Time Perspective and Socioemotional Functioning

Aging has been associated with a motivational shift to positive over negative information (i.e., positivity effect), which is often explained by a limited future time perspective (FTP) within the framework of socioemotional selectivity theory (SST). However, whether a limited FTP functions similarly in younger and older adults, and whether inter-individual differences in socioemotional functioning are similarly associated with preference for positive information (i.e., positivity) is still not clear. We investigated younger (20–35 years, N = 73) and older (60–75 years, N = 56) adults’ gaze preferences on pairs of happy, angry, sad, and neutral faces using an eye-tracking system. We additionally assessed several parameters potentially underlying inter-individual differences in emotion processing such as FTP, stress, cognitive functioning, social support, emotion regulation, and well-being. While we found no age-related differences in positivity when the entire trial duration was considered, older adults showed longer fixations on the more positive face in later stages of processing (i.e., positivity shifts). This allocation of resources toward more positive stimuli might serve an emotion regulatory purpose and seems consistent with the SST. However, our findings suggest that age moderates the relationship between FTP and positivity shifts, such that the relationship between FTP and positivity preferences was negative in older, and positive in younger adults, potentially stemming from an age-related differential meaning of the FTP construct across age. Furthermore, our exploratory analyses showed that along with the age and FTP interaction, lower levels of worry also played a significant role in positivity shifts. We conclude that positivity effects cannot be solely explained by aging, or the associated reduced FTP per se, but is rather determined by a complex interplay of psychosocial and emotional features.

Age-related variability in decision-making: Insights from neurochemistry

Despite dopamine's significant role in models of value-based decision-making and findings demonstrating loss of dopamine function in aging, evidence of systematic changes in decision-making over the life span remains elusive. Previous studies attempting to resolve the neural basis of age-related alteration in decision-making have typically focused on physical age, which can be a poor proxy for age-related effects on neural systems. There is growing appreciation that aging has heterogeneous effects on distinct components of the dopamine system within subject in addition to substantial variability between subjects. We propose that some of the conflicting findings in age-related effects on decision-making may be reconciled if we can observe the underlying dopamine components within individuals. This can be achieved by incorporating in vivo imaging techniques including positron emission tomography (PET) and neuromelanin-sensitive MR. Further, we discuss how affective factors may contribute to individual differences in decision-making performance among older adults. Specifically, we propose that age-related shifts in affective attention ("positivity effect") can, in some cases, counteract the impact of altered dopamine function on specific decision-making processes, contributing to variability in findings. In an effort to provide clarity to the field and advance productive hypothesis testing, we propose ways in which in vivo dopamine imaging can be leveraged to disambiguate dopaminergic influences on decision-making, and suggest strategies for assessing individual differences in the contribution of affective attentional focus.

Self-Efficacy for Physical Activity-A Question of Item Framing and Age?

Older adults process and remember positive information relatively better than negative information, compared with younger adults; this is known as the positivity effect. This study examined whether older adults compared with younger adults also respond differently to positively and negatively framed questionnaire items. Participants (N = 275; age = 18-81 years) were randomly assigned to a positively or negatively framed version of a self-efficacy for physical activity questionnaire. Self-efficacy, physical activity intentions, and planned physical activity in the following week were regressed on experimental group and age, controlling for baseline physical activity and covariates. A significant Age × Frame interaction showed that item framing made a difference in planned physical activity for the oldest age group (+350 min compared with the youngest group). This study provides initial support for the positivity effect in item framing on physical activity plans, but not on intentions or self-efficacy. Item framing should be taken into consideration for accurate measurement, but could also be a simple intervention approach.

Words matter: age-related positivity in episodic memory for abstract but not concrete words

Research continues to assess potential boundary conditions for the age-related positivity effect in emotional information processing. Beyond the valence and arousal characteristics of a stimulus, other features may play a role in the manifestation of positivity effects. Differences between abstract and concrete words (i.e., the level of imageability, presence of affective content) may lead to differences in downstream processing outcomes. The present study examined whether additional features of word stimuli, beyond valence and arousal, could influence the emergence of age-related positivity in episodic memory. Fifty-two younger adults and 51 older adults completed a categorization task where they separated a series of positive, negative, and neutral words into "abstract" or "concrete" categories. A surprise recognition task followed after a short delay. Results revealed a three-way Age × Valence × Word Type interaction. No age differences in overall recognition was observed for concrete words, regardless of emotion; however, for abstract words, an Age × Valence interaction emerged whereby older adults recognized more positive than negative words, while valence differences were less pronounced among younger adults. Concrete words were remembered better than abstract words by both age groups, regardless of valence. Conversely, preferential processing appeared to occur for positive abstract words, especially for older adults. We contend that these results provide further evidence of the top-down and controlled nature of age-related positivity effects in episodic memory.

Examining Positivity Effect and Working Memory in Young-Old and Very Old Adults Using EEG-Derived Cognitive State Metrics

The positivity effect among older adults is a tendency to process more positive and/or less negative emotional stimuli compared to younger adults, with unknown upper age boundaries. Cognitive and emotional working memory were assessed in young-old adults (60-75) and very old adults (VOAs; 80+) to determine whether emotional working memory declines similar to the age-related decline of cognitive working memory. The moderating role of valence on the link between age and emotional working memory was examined to identify change in positivity effect with advanced age. Electroencephalography (EEG) markers of cognitive workload and engagement were obtained to test the theory of cognitive resource allocation in older adults' emotional stimuli processing. EEG recordings were collected during cognitive memory task and emotional working memory tasks that required rating emotional intensity of images pairs. Results indicate a positivity effect among VOAs that does not require additional cognitive effort and is not likely to diminish with age.

False Recognition of Emotionally Categorized Pictures in Young and Older Adults

Normal aging is associated with the shift in motivational priorities from knowledge acquisition to emotion regulation. Current evidence indicates an age-related increase in preferences for positive over negative stimuli in true memory. In the present study, using the categorized pictures paradigm, we investigated whether older adults would exhibit a greater increase in false memory for positive versus negative lures, compared with young adults. We also examined the association of executive functioning with the preferences for positive over negative pictures in false recognition memory. A total of 27 young and 26 older adults studied emotional pictures from various categories during encoding and subsequently completed an old/new recognition test. In addition, all participants completed the executive functioning tests. The results revealed that both older and young adults showed higher rates of false recognition for positive pictures compared with negative pictures; no significant group by valence interaction was observed. Trail making scores were negatively correlated with positive processing preferences in false recognition rates in older but not young adults. These findings suggest that false recognition memory exhibits preferences toward positively valenced stimuli in both young and older adults. Cognitive control processes are necessary for older adults to distort memory in emotionally gratifying ways.

The impact of emotional faces on younger and older adults' attentional blink

The attentional blink (AB) is the impaired ability to detect a second target (T2) when it follows shortly after the first (T1) among distractors in a rapid serial visual presentation (RSVP). Given questions about the automaticity of age differences in emotion processing, the current study examined whether emotion cues differentially impact the AB elicited in older and younger adults. Twenty-two younger (18-22 years) and 22 older adult participants (62-78 years) reported on the emotional content of target face stimulus pairs embedded in a RSVP of scrambled-face distractor images. Target pairs included photo-realistic faces of angry, happy, and neutral expressions. The order of emotional and neutral stimuli as T1 or T2 and the degree of temporal separation within the RSVP systematically varied. Target detection accuracy was used to operationalise the AB. Although older adults displayed a larger AB than younger adults, no age differences emerged in the impact of emotion on the AB. Angry T1 faces increased the AB of both age groups. Neither emotional T2 attenuated the AB. Negative facial expressions held the attention of younger and older adults in a comparable manner, exacerbating the AB and supporting a negativity bias instead of a positivity effect in older adults.

Integrating cognitive and emotion paradigms to address the paradox of aging

Thirty years ago, the subfields of emotion and cognition operated relatively independently and the associated science reflected the tacit view that they were distinct constructs. Today, questions about the integration of cognition and emotion are among the most interesting questions in the field. I offer a personal view of the key changes that fuelled this shift over time and describe research from my group that unfolded in parallel and led to the identification of the positivity effect.

Own-Age Bias and Positivity Effects in Facial Recognition

Background/Study Context - In the current study, we evaluated two age-related differences in recognition memory: the own-age bias, wherein older and younger adults best recognize those of their own age group, and an age-related positivity effect, wherein older adults recall positive emotional information better than negative information relative to younger adults. We sought to extend previous research that jointly investigated these variables in recognition memory. Methods - Younger (age 18 - 27) and older (age 62 - 80) adults completed an incidental encoding task on a sequence of 50 positive, negative, or neutrally valenced images of older and younger adult faces. After a distractor task, participants made forced-choice recognition judgments and rated their decision confidence for images that were repeated with the same or a different emotional expression, and for novel, previously unseen faces. Results - Older and younger adults' recognition discriminability did not differ significantly between age groups. Notably, the data indicated an own-age bias in young adults, but not in older adults, and both age groups' recognition accuracy was greatest for faces that had originally been shown with a positive emotional expression. Conclusion - To our knowledge, this research is the first to demonstrate an own-age recognition bias in younger adults for emotional faces. Although our predictions of a differential impact by emotional faces on recognition of same and other-age faces were not supported, we identify a number of factors that contextualize these findings in the recent literature.

Sleep facilitates consolidation of positive emotional memory in healthy older adults

Evidence has demonstrated that sleep-related memory consolidation declines in ageing. However, little is known about age-related changes to sleep-related emotional memory consolidation, especially when considering the positivity effect observed in older adults. In the present study, we sought to explore whether there is a positive emotional bias in sleep-related memory consolidation among healthy older adults. Young and older adults were randomly assigned either into a sleep or wake condition. All participants encoded positive, negative, and neutral stimuli and underwent recognition tests immediately (test 1), after a 12-hour sleep/wake interval (test 2), and 3 days after test 2 (test 3). Results showed that age-related differences of sleep beneficial effect were modulated by emotion valence. In particular, sleep selectively enhanced positive memory in older adults, while in young adults sleep beneficial effect was manifested in neutral memory. Moreover, the sleep beneficial effect can be maintained at least 3 days in both young and older adults. These findings suggest that older adults had preserved but positive bias of sleep-related memory consolidation, which could be one of the underlying mechanisms for their generally better emotional well-being in daily life. These findings highlight the dynamic interplay among sleep and emotional memory in older adults.

Effect of sleep deprivation on emotional working memory

The emotional dysregulation and impaired working memory found after sleep loss can have severe implications for our daily functioning. Considering the intertwined relationship between emotion and cognition in stimuli processing, there could be further implications of sleep deprivation in high‐complex emotional situations. Although studied separately, this interaction between emotion and cognitive processes has been neglected in sleep research. The aim of the present study was to investigate the effect of 1 night of sleep deprivation on emotional working memory. Sixty‐one healthy participants (mean age: 23.4 years) were either sleep deprived for 1 night (n = 30) or had a normal night’s sleep (n = 31). They performed an N‐back task with two levels of working memory load (1‐back and 3‐back) using positive, neutral and negative picture scenes. Sleep deprivation, compared with full night sleep, impaired emotional working memory accuracy, but not reaction times. The sleep‐deprived participants, but not the controls, responded faster to positive than to negative and neutral pictures. The effect of sleep deprivation was similar for both high and low working memory loads. The results showed that although detrimental in terms of accuracy, sleep deprivation did not impair working memory speed. In fact, our findings indicate that positive stimuli may facilitate working memory processing speed after sleep deprivation.

Characterizing age-related positivity effects in situation selection

Situation selection-choosing to enter or avoid situations based on how they will likely make you feel-is theorized to be a useful emotion regulation strategy, especially in older age (Charles, 2010; Urry & Gross, 2010). However, research on the use of situation selection for emotion regulation is limited, and the existing findings about age differences are mixed, with some studies finding age differences and others not. We investigated whether there are overall age differences in the types of emotional situations people select by conducting a "mini" meta-analysis to synthesize all existing data from a situation selection paradigm used in our lab. We also explored potential moderators of age differences in situation selection, including properties of the stimuli options and information available to participants. We did not find overall age differences in the emotional situations younger and older adults select, though age differences are larger in contexts in which emotional information is more relevant or highly arousing.

Age differences in the neural response to negative feedback

Affective processing is one domain that remains relatively intact in healthy aging. Investigations into the neural responses associated with reward anticipation have revealed that older and younger adults recruit the same midbrain reward regions, but other evidence suggests this recruitment may differ depending on the valence (gain, loss) of the incentive cue. The goal of the current study was to examine functional covariance during gain and loss feedback in younger and healthy older adults. A group of 15 older adults (mean age = 68.5) and 16 younger adults (mean age = 25.4) completed a revised Monetary Incentive Delay task (rMID; Knutson, Westdorp, Kaiser, & Hommer, 2000) while in the fMRI scanner. The rMID is a reaction time task where successful performance, either gaining a reward or avoiding a loss, is defined by hitting a button during the brief presentation of a visual target. Participants receive gain and loss anticipation cues before each trial and feedback after each trial with four possible outcomes: +$5.00, +0.00, -$5.00, and -$0.00. Using seed-voxel partial least squares analyses, with seed voxels in the caudate and ventromedial prefrontal cortex, whole-brain functional covariance revealed that younger and older adults engage the same network of regions to support general feedback processing. However, older adults engaged two additional networks to support processing of negative feedback, gain_miss (+0), loss_miss (-$5), and loss_hit (-0), specifically. These findings are in line with theories of a positivity effect in aging and may have implications for reward-stimulus learning and decision making following performance-contingent negative feedback.

Age Differences in the Experience of Daily Life Events: A Study Based on the Social Goals Perspective

This study examined age differences in daily life events related to different types of social goals based on the socioemotional selectivity theory (SST), and determined whether the positivity effect existed in the context of social goals in older adults' daily lives. Over a course of 14 days, 49 older adults and 36 younger adults wrote about up to three life events daily and rated the valence of each event. The findings indicated that (1) although both older and younger adults recorded events related to both emotional and knowledge-acquisition goals, the odds ratio for reporting a higher number of events related to emotional goals compared to the number of events related to knowledge-acquisition goals was 2.12 times higher in older adults than that observed in younger adults. (2) Considering the number of events, there was an age-related positivity effect only for knowledge-related goals, and (3) older adults' ratings for events related to emotional and knowledge-acquisition goals were significantly more positive compared to those observed in younger adults. These findings supported the SST, and to some extent, the positivity effect was demonstrated in the context of social goals.

Age-Based Positivity Effects in Imagining and Recalling Future Positive and Negative Autobiographical Events

Thoughts about the future reflect personal goals, and projections into the future enrich our emotional life. Researchers have taken an interest in determining whether the tendency to remember more positive than negative emotional events observed when recalling past events also appears when remembering imagined future events. The objective of this study was to examine the age-based positivity effect of recall for future positive and negative autobiographical events in young and older adults. Representative future events were first established to develop the cues used to prompt personal future events. In the production task, the participants were presented with eight positive and eight negative random future events of young or older adults as a model and the corresponding cues to generate their own positive and negative future autobiographical events. In the recall task, the participants recovered as many experiences as they could of the model and the positive and negative events produced by themselves. The participants correctly recalled more positive than negative events and committed more errors for negative than positive events, showing a clear tendency in both young and older adults to recall future imagined events as positive. Regarding age, the young adults recalled more events than the older participants whilst the older participants in particular showed better recall of their own imagined future events than the model’s events, and committed more errors when recalling the model’s events than their own imagined events. Regarding the positivity effect in incorrect recall, more than half of the errors were valence changes, most of these being from negative to positive events, and these valence changes were more pronounced in the older than in the younger adults. In general, there were fewer differences between young and older adults in the recall of positive events in comparison with negative events. Our findings suggest that people are well disposed toward recalling positive imagined future events and preserve a positive emotional state, suppressing negative memories.

The roles of chronological age and time perspective in memory positivity

The observation that older adults show enhanced cognition for emotionally positive information has been labeled the positivity effect (Reed, Chan, & Mikels, 2014). According to the Socioemotional Selectivity Theory (SST, Carstensen, 1991), a prominent lifespan development theory, cognition is strongly influenced by motivational goals, and these goals are impacted by subjective time perspective. Although the positivity effect is most commonly observed in older adults, as age usually co-varies with time perspective, the SST posits that time perspective, not age, is the key explanatory factor of positivity. We examined the effects of these predictors on positivity in an episodic memory task in younger and older adults and found that age, not time perspective, was a key predictor of memory positivity. Our results add to the growing literature that challenge the notion that time perspective is the driving force behind age-related differences in emotional processing and functioning.

Processing Distracting Non-face Emotional Images: No Evidence of an Age-Related Positivity Effect

Cognitive aging may be accompanied by increased prioritization of social and emotional goals that enhance positive experiences and emotional states. The socioemotional selectivity theory suggests this may be achieved by giving preference to positive information and avoiding or suppressing negative information. Although there is some evidence of a positivity bias in controlled attention tasks, it remains unclear whether a positivity bias extends to the processing of affective stimuli presented outside focused attention. In two experiments, we investigated age-related differences in the effects of to-be-ignored non-face affective images on target processing. In Experiment 1, 27 older (64-90 years) and 25 young adults (19-29 years) made speeded valence judgments about centrally presented positive or negative target images taken from the International Affective Picture System. To-be-ignored distractor images were presented above and below the target image and were either positive, negative, or neutral in valence. The distractors were considered task relevant because they shared emotional characteristics with the target stimuli. Both older and young adults responded slower to targets when distractor valence was incongruent with target valence relative to when distractors were neutral. Older adults responded faster to positive than to negative targets but did not show increased interference effects from positive distractors. In Experiment 2, affective distractors were task irrelevant as the target was a three-digit array and did not share emotional characteristics with the distractors. Twenty-six older (63-84 years) and 30 young adults (18-30 years) gave speeded responses on a digit disparity task while ignoring the affective distractors positioned in the periphery. Task performance in either age group was not influenced by the task-irrelevant affective images. In keeping with the socioemotional selectivity theory, these findings suggest that older adults preferentially process task-relevant positive non-face images but only when presented within the main focus of attention.

Age-related differences in processes organizing goal-directed locomotion toward emotional pictures

Previous studies yielded evidence for an interaction between age and valence in numerous cognitive processes. But, to date, no research has been conducted in the field of motor skills. In this study, we examined the age-related differences in the organization of an emotionally goal-directed locomotion task. Faced with a pleasant, unpleasant, or neutral picture displayed to the side of a stop button, younger and older adults were instructed to walk toward the button (intermediate goal) and push it to turn-off the picture (final goal). Kinematic and ground reaction forces were recorded. The main findings indicated that older adults' response times (RTs) did not differ across the valence picture. The fastest RTs were found in younger adults when faced with pleasant pictures, suggesting that older people may focus either on intermediate or final goals, depending on their value of pleasantness, and prioritize positive goals. We also found that the spatial coding of locomotion (trajectory and final body position) was affected in the same way by the valence of the intermediate goal in both age groups. Taken together, these findings provide new perspectives regarding the potential role of the emotional valence of the intermediate and final goals on the cognitive processes involved in action coding, such as in mental representations of action in older adults.

Modulation of Prepulse Inhibition and Startle Reflex by Emotions: A Comparison between Young and Older Adults

This study examined whether or not the acoustic startle response and sensorimotor gating may be modulated by emotions differentially between young and older adults. Two groups of participants (mean age Young: 24 years old; Elderly: 63.6 years old) were presented with three types of auditory stimuli (Startle alone, High or Low frequency Prepulse) while viewing pleasant, neutral, or unpleasant images. Electromyographic activity of the eyeblink response was measured. Results show that older adults displayed diminished eyeblink responses whereas younger adults displayed enhanced eyeblink responses when viewing negative images. Sensorimotor gating also differed between young and older adults, with enhanced sensorimotor gating abilities while viewing positive pictures in older adults and diminished abilities while viewing negative pictures among younger adults. These results argue in favor of a differential emotional influence on the sensorimotor abilities of young and older adults, with a positivity bias among the latter.

Age-related differences in recall for words using semantics and prosody

The positivity effect is a developmental shift seen in older adults to be increasingly influenced by positive information in areas such as memory, attention, and decision-making. This study is the first to examine the age-related differences of the positivity effect for emotional prosody. Participants heard a factorial combination of words that were semantically positive or negative said with either positive or negative intonation. Results showed a semantic positivity effect for older adults, and a prosody positivity effect for younger adults. Additionally, older adults showed a significant decrease in recall for semantically negative words said in an incongruent prosodically positive tone.

Promoting walking in older adults: Perceived neighborhood walkability influences the effectiveness of motivational messages

Positively framed messages seem to promote walking in older adults better than negatively framed messages. This study targeted elderly people in communities unfavorable to walking. Walking was measured with pedometers during baseline (1 week) and intervention (4 weeks). Participants ( n = 74) were informed about either the benefits of walking or the negative consequences of not walking. Perceived neighborhood walkability was assessed with a modified version of the Neighborhood Walkability Scale. When perceived walkability was high, positively framed messages were more effective than negatively framed messages in promoting walking; when perceived walkability was low, negatively framed messages were comparably effective to positively framed messages.

Age-related differences in attention and memory toward emotional stimuli

From the perspectives of time perception and motivation, socioemotional selectivity theory (SST) postulates that in comparison with younger adults, older adults tend to prefer positive stimuli and avoid negative stimuli. Currently the cross-cultural consistency of this positivity effect (PE) is still not clear. While empirical evidence for Western populations is accumulating, the validation of the PE in Asians is still rare. The current study compared 28 younger and 24 older Chinese adults in the processing of emotional information. Eye-tracking and recognition data of participants in processing pictures with positive, negative, or neutral emotional information sampled from the International Affection Picture System were collected. The results showed less negative bias for emotional attention in older adults than in younger adults, whereas for emotional recognition, only younger adults showed a negative bias while older adults showed no bias between negative and positive emotional information. Overall, compared with younger adults, emotional processing was more positive in older adults. It was concluded that Chinese older adults show a PE.

Examining the Positivity Effect in Autobiographical Memory Across Adulthood

The positivity effect in memory is characterized by enhanced memory for emotionally positive information or decreased memory for emotionally negative information with increased age. The goals of the current study were to (a) examine the positivity effect in autobiographical memory using instructions that limited experimental constraints, (b) examine the relationship between memory valence and subjective well-being, and (c) examine the relationship between age and other memory characteristics across adulthood. In the current study, 281 individuals between the ages of 18 and 94 (Mage=53.14, SD=17.04) completed a modified Memory Experiences Questionnaire using online survey methods. Participants answered questions about emotional valence and other phenomenological characteristics regarding two memories, including any specific memory of their choosing and a personally meaningful memory. Results indicated that memory valence was unrelated to age, thus failing to provide evidence for the positivity effect. However, memory valence was found to be a significant predictor of life satisfaction. Age moderated the relationship between memory valence and subjective well-being but did so differently across the two memories. Age was also associated with increased vividness, coherence, sensory detail, time clarity, and a first-person perspective for the personally meaningful memory.

Changes in Optimism Are Associated with Changes in Health Over Time Among Older Adults

Little is known about how optimism differs by age and changes over time, particularly among older adults. Even less is known about how changes in optimism are related to changes in physical health. We examined age differences and longitudinal changes in optimism in 9,790 older adults over a four-year period. We found an inverted U-shaped pattern between optimism and age both cross-sectionally and longitudinally, such that optimism generally increased in older adults before decreasing. Increases in optimism over a four-year period were associated with improvements in self-rated health and fewer chronic illnesses over the same time frame. The findings from the current study are consistent with changes in emotion regulation strategies employed by older adults and age-related changes in well-being.

Positivity effect in source attributions of arousal-matched emotional and non-emotional words during item-based directed forgetting

Consistent with their emphasis on emotional goals, older adults often exhibit a positivity bias in attention and memory relative to their young counterparts (i.e., a positivity effect). The current study sought to determine how this age-related positivity effect would impact intentional forgetting of emotional words, a process critical to efficient operation of memory. Using an item-based directed forgetting task, 36 young and 36 older adults studied a series of arousal-equivalent words that varied in valence (i.e., positive, negative, and neutral). Each word was followed by a cue to either remember or forget the word. A subsequent "tagging" recognition task required classification of items as to-be-remembered (TBR), to-be-forgotten (TBF), or new as a measure of directed forgetting and source attribution in participants' memory. Neither young nor older adults' intentional forgetting was affected by the valence of words. A goal-consistent valence effect did, however, emerge in older adults' source attribution performance. Specifically, older adults assigned more TBR-cues to positive words and more TBF-cues to negative words. Results are discussed in light of existing literature on emotion and directed forgetting as well as the socioemotional selectivity theory underlying the age-related positivity effect.

Age-related alterations of brain network underlying the retrieval of emotional autobiographical memories: an fMRI study using independent component analysis

Normal aging has been shown to modulate the neural underpinnings of autobiographical memory and emotion processing. Moreover, previous researches have suggested that aging produces a “positivity effect” in autobiographical memory. Although a few imaging studies have investigated the neural mechanism of the positivity effect, the neural substrates underlying the positivity effect in emotional autobiographical memory is unclear. To understand the age-related neural changes in emotional autobiographical memory that underlie the positivity effect, the present functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) study used the independent component analysis (ICA) method to compare brain networks in younger and older adults as they retrieved positive and negative autobiographical events. Compared to their younger counterparts, older adults reported relatively higher positive feelings when retrieving emotional autobiographical events. Imaging data indicated an age-related reversal within the ventromedial prefrontal/anterior cingulate cortex (VMPFC/ACC) and the left amygdala of the brain networks that were engaged in the retrieval of autobiographical events with different valence. The retrieval of negative events compared to positive events induced stronger activity in the VMPFC/ACC and weaker activity in the amygdala for the older adults, whereas the younger adults showed a reversed pattern. Moreover, activity in the VMPFC/ACC within the task-related networks showed a negative correlation with the emotional valence intensity. These results may suggest that the positivity effect in older adults' autobiographical memories is potentially due to age-related changes in controlled emotional processing implemented by the VMPFC/ACC-amygdala circuit.

Age differences in the default network at rest and the relation to self-referential processing

Older adults show a 'positivity bias' in tasks involving emotion and self-referential processing. A critical network that is involved in self-referencing and shows age-related decline is the default network (DN). The purpose of the current study was to investigate age differences in pre- and post-task DN functional connectivity (FC) and signal variability, and to examine whether they are predictive of the positivity bias in self-referencing. We measured FC and within-subject variability of the DN in resting-state scans preceding and following tasks involving personality judgements on the self and a close other. Older adults endorsed more positive traits than younger adults on both tasks. FC was weaker post-task in older vs younger adults, and younger adults had greater variability than older adults in DN nodes. Younger adults with higher post-task DN variability had more negative self-ratings. For both age groups, greater FC in the DN was associated with more negative self-ratings. Neither FC nor variability was related to other ratings, despite the potential for self-processing when making other judgements. Our findings suggest that ageing leads to reduced FC and variability in the DN, which is most apparent after task, and may be one mechanism underlying the positive bias with age.

Age-related differences in affective responses to and memory for emotions conveyed by music: a cross-sectional study

There is mounting evidence that aging is associated with the maintenance of positive affect and the decrease of negative affect to ensure emotion regulation goals. Previous empirical studies have primarily focused on a visual or autobiographical form of emotion communication. To date, little investigation has been done on musical emotions. The few studies that have addressed aging and emotions in music were mainly interested in emotion recognition, thus leaving unexplored the question of how aging may influence emotional responses to and memory for emotions conveyed by music. In the present study, eighteen older (60–84 years) and eighteen younger (19–24 years) listeners were asked to evaluate the strength of their experienced emotion on happy, peaceful, sad, and scary musical excerpts (Vieillard et al., 2008) while facial muscle activity was recorded. Participants then performed an incidental recognition task followed by a task in which they judged to what extent they experienced happiness, peacefulness, sadness, and fear when listening to music. Compared to younger adults, older adults (a) reported a stronger emotional reactivity for happiness than other emotion categories, (b) showed an increased zygomatic activity for scary stimuli, (c) were more likely to falsely recognize happy music, and (d) showed a decrease in their responsiveness to sad and scary music. These results are in line with previous findings and extend them to emotion experience and memory recognition, corroborating the view of age-related changes in emotional responses to music in a positive direction away from negativity.

Age-related differences in event-related potentials for early visual processing of emotional faces

With advancing age, processing resources are shifted away from negative emotional stimuli and toward positive ones. Here, we explored this 'positivity effect' using event-related potentials (ERPs). Participants identified the presence or absence of a visual probe that appeared over photographs of emotional faces. The ERPs elicited by the onsets of angry, sad, happy and neutral faces were recorded. We examined the frontocentral emotional positivity (FcEP), which is defined as a positive deflection in the waveforms elicited by emotional expressions relative to neutral faces early on in the time course of the ERP. The FcEP is thought to reflect enhanced early processing of emotional expressions. The results show that within the first 130 ms young adults show an FcEP to negative emotional expressions, whereas older adults show an FcEP to positive emotional expressions. These findings provide additional evidence that the age-related positivity effect in emotion processing can be traced to automatic processes that are evident very early in the processing of emotional facial expressions.

The theory behind the age-related positivity effect

The "positivity effect" refers to an age-related trend that favors positive over negative stimuli in cognitive processing. Relative to their younger counterparts, older people attend to and remember more positive than negative information. Since the effect was initially identified and the conceptual basis articulated (Mather and Carstensen, 2005) scores of independent replications and related findings have appeared in the literature. Over the same period, a number of investigations have failed to observe age differences in the cognitive processing of emotional material. When findings are considered in theoretical context, a reliable pattern of evidence emerges that helps to refine conceptual tenets. In this article we articulate the operational definition and theoretical foundations of the positivity effect and review the empirical evidence based on studies of visual attention, memory, decision making, and neural activation. We conclude with a discussion of future research directions with emphasis on the conditions where a focus on positive information may benefit and/or impair cognitive performance in older people.

The theory behind the age-related positivity effect

The "positivity effect" refers to an age-related trend that favors positive over negative stimuli in cognitive processing. Relative to their younger counterparts, older people attend to and remember more positive than negative information. Since the effect was initially identified and the conceptual basis articulated (Mather and Carstensen, 2005) scores of independent replications and related findings have appeared in the literature. Over the same period, a number of investigations have failed to observe age differences in the cognitive processing of emotional material. When findings are considered in theoretical context, a reliable pattern of evidence emerges that helps to refine conceptual tenets. In this article we articulate the operational definition and theoretical foundations of the positivity effect and review the empirical evidence based on studies of visual attention, memory, decision making, and neural activation. We conclude with a discussion of future research directions with emphasis on the conditions where a focus on positive information may benefit and/or impair cognitive performance in older people.