Transcript Memory Performance and Aging

Memory Performance
and Aging
PS277 – Lecture 7
Memory and the Self
 Memory as critical to defining who we are,
giving us a sense of continuity through time
 Alzheimer’s as such a powerful, frightening
example of problems in this – losing sense of
self, ability to recognize others, etc. – “Still
Alice”
 Clinical cases of people who have lost memory
function…HM had his hippocampus removed,
failed to transfer info into LTM and could not
retain any new information
Outline
 Types of Memory and Aging
 Factors Influencing Memory
Performance and Aging
 Memory Training
Types of Memory - Outline
 Working and short-term memory
 Long-term memory
 Autobiographical memory
 Implicit memory
 Prospective memory
Denise Park’s (2006) Summary on
Aging and Working Memory
Park’s (2002) Adult Lifespan
Memory Performance Model
Long-Term Memory
 Semantic Memory – memory for general
information (e.g., words and concepts, etc.) –
capital of France = ?
 Episodic Memory – memory for information
from a specific event or moment in time –
looking over Paris at night on visit
 Implicit Memory – non-explicit, effortless, non-
conscious memory that shows some effects of
earlier exposure (“savings” – e.g., riding a bike)
Autobiographical Memory – A
Key Type of Personal Memory
 Memories of 9/11?
 Information and events from own life, recalled from own
specific point of view
 Helps to anchor sense of self, continuity over time
 Involves both episodic and semantic properties
(memories for specific events vs. general knowledge like
faces, names, dates, etc.)
 Generally semantic memories not as much affected by
age as episodic – why?
Autobiographical Memory The Far Side Version
Personal Autobiographical
Memories – Piolino et al. (2002)
 Recall of general information from a time
period: names of people, an important date, a
specific address
 Recall of episodic memory from a period: first
meeting with spouse, a day during a holiday trip
 Participants: 40s, 50s, 60s ,70s
 General patterns shown included “memory
bump,” “childhood amnesia” for all age groups
Memory Bump and Childhood Amnesia in
Autobiographical Recall - Conway
Piolino et al. Results
 Semantic memories:
Older adults did
equivalently with
young on
information recall
 Episodic memories:
More contextual
detail in event
memory, this is
poorer for older
folks.
Implicit Memory
 Procedural Memories: e.g., riding a bike
 Clinical Evidence: Severe amnesia for explicit
memories (Brenda Milner’s case H.M. – had
hippocampus removed, could not recognize
nurse who kept coming in to take care of him),
but still can “remember” things unconsciously –
e.g., could still find his way to old home if you
put him back in his old neighborhood, etc.
 Automatic Priming and Aging Patterns: very
limited evidence of declines with age
Prospective Memory (Jacoby
et al.)
 Remembering future intentions (paying bills, taking
medications, etc.) … remembering to remember
 Must also monitor whether you have previously done
these intended tasks in everyday life (locked the car
doors?) – an example of source monitoring (where
does “memory” come from - action vs. imagination)
 Older adults generally more likely to feel that they might
not have done tasks than younger adults, so criterion was
different, but overall they made more errors of
commission, younger made more errors of omission
 Overall, prospective memory is not too much related to
age, however
Factors in Memory
Performance in Older Adults
 Use of Strategies
 Metamemory
 Memory Stereotypes about Aging
 Expertise
Memory Strategies in Older
Adults
 Strategies are deliberate activities designed to
improve memory (e.g., tie string around finger)
 Older adults don’t spontaneously use these as much as
younger adults (like kids and production deficit)
 Book gives example of TOT states, which are more
common in older adults, who may not do as much to
search for items as young…on other hand, older adults
know these items will eventually surface spontaneously
 Using strategies helps remembering, but doesn’t fully
account for age differences in recall (Herzog et al., 1998)
 Older adults may not execute strategies as well, either
Metamemory and Aging
 Knowledge about how memory works, general theories,
expectancies about aging and memory as example
 Older adults do a bit less well on knowledge of memory
system, knowledge of strategies, when to use them, etc.
But some phenomena like TOT states might be
understood better
 Memory self-efficacy as a type of metamemory: expect
memory to decline with age, so feel less control and
effectiveness
 Somewhat, but only modestly, predictive of actual
memory performance problems – and what causes what?
Memory Stereotypes and
Performance – Cultural Differences
(Levy & Langer, 1994)
 Younger and older Chinese and American
samples (ages 22 vs. 70)
 Assessed immediate and longer term memory
for pictures matched with activities, visual dot
displays, etc.
 Measured stereotypes about aging with
Palmore’s FAQ and “list adjectives” task: first 5
words that come to mind when think of old
person?
Results: Culture Differences in
Positivity of Stereotypes of Aging
6
5
4
American
Chinese
3
2
1
0
Young
Old
Culture Differences in Memory
Performance by Age Group
2
1.5
1
0.5
0
-0.5
-1
-1.5
-2
-2.5
-3
American
Chinese
Young
Old
Relations Between Positive Aging
Views and Memory Performance
 Young adults: very little relation
between positive views of aging and
memory performance
 Older adults: consistent positive relation
between positive views of aging actual
memory performance
Story Vignette (Erber, 1990)
 “Mrs. X, age ___, found that she was behind schedule in
running her errands at the local shopping center. She
had promised to drop something off at the home of an
acquaintance, and decided to call her to let her know she
would be late. She located a pay telephone and looked
up the number in the phone book, which was hanging on
a metal ring. She dropped the coin into the slot. After
she dialed the first 3 numbers, however, she could not
remember the rest. She had to hang up the phone and
lift up the telephone book so that she could look up the
number again.”
 Causes? Sign of Mental Problems? Need for Training?
 Predictions for Age of Target, Age of Rater?
Judging Everyday Memory
Failures (Erber et al., 1990)
 Young (age 24) and older (age 71) adults read 8 stories
about a forgetting problem
 Half in each group were instructed that the adult woman
in the story was young, half that she was older
 Memory problems: absentmindedness, forgetting
someone’s name, forgetting to buy something at grocery
store, failing to recognize someone you know in a new
context, etc.
 Rated: causes of memory problem, sign of mental
difficulty, need for training, should be referred for
assessment
Erber et al. Results for Age of
Target
6
5
4
3
Young T
Older T
2
1
0
other pro mental
diff
mem
train
Expertise and Aging
 More experience you have in a domain, the better you
will do in recall (chess example of Chi’s research on kids)
 Largely the result of reorganizing the knowledge base
and chunking of information that allows more storage
 Both young and older pilots showed these effects quite
clearly in some studies on age differences in memory for
aviation texts, but age differences between young and old
remained after these expertise effects were controlled
…(Morrow et al. study)
Chi’s Research on Chess
Expertise and Recall in Kids