Neuroscience of

Aging & Cognitive

Health
WEEK 3
Week 2 CON'T
Dedifferentiation Hypothesis

 Brain: Reduced hemispheric asymmetry in old adults may reflect

age-related difficulty in recruiting specialized neural mechanisms
 Less specialized patterns of activation
 Behaviour: Correlations among different cognitive measures
increase with age.
 Generally considered to be a ‘negative’ process.

Young Old
Compensation Hypothesis

 Increased bilaterality in older adults could help

counteract age-related neurocognitive deficits
 Increased recruitment is an example of the brain
reorganizing to compensate for the effects of aging
 Evidence
 Brain changes in high and low performing olderadults.
Alternative Hypothesis

 Other models of brain reorganization (neuroplasticity) to

compensate for the effects of brain aging.
 Posterior to Anterior Shift in Aging (Davis et al., 2008)
 Increased recruitment of anterior brain regions (frontal lobes)
 Default to Executive Coupling Hypothesis of Aging (Turner
and Spreng, 2015)
 Increased connectivity between the default network and frontal
brain regions = integration of prior knowledge into complex
cognition
Chapter 5
Types of Memory
Information Processing Model

 Sensory Store
 Momentary perceptual trace

 Short-Term Store
 Primary memory
 Working memory

 Long-Term Store
 Procedural memory
 Semantic memory
 Episodic memory
Cortical Volumes in Aging
Episodic Memory in Older Adults

Older adults show a decline in episodic memory.

 Encoding is less ‘strategic’ (e.g., not grouping by semantic categories).
 Retrieval can be supported by cuing (i.e., better recognition than free
recall).
 Retrieval can also be supported by prior knowledge (semantics).

 Autobiographical Memory:
 Descriptions become less detailed and
more semantically inclined in older age
 Preference for recall of positive events/details
Socioemotional Selectivity Theory (Carstensen)
 Autobiographical recall becomes “fuzzier and rosier”
Semantic Memory

Facts or general world knowledge

Older Adults:
 Show minimal declines in vocabulary, knowledge of historical facts, and
knowledge of concepts
 Older adults can retrieve already learned semantic information, and can
learn new semantic information

 Tip-of-the-tongue phenomenon
Non-content Attributes of Episodic Memory

 Source memory
 Where or from whom was information acquired?

 Temporal memory
 When did an event occur and which event occurred
more recently?

 Frequency-of-occurrence memory
 How frequently did an event occur?
Stages of Processing in Episodic Memory

 Encoding
 Forming a memory trace to enter into the long-term store

 Storage
 Bin where memory traces are stored for a long time, often
permanently

 Retrieval
 Getting information out of long-term storage
Types of Encoding

 Elaborative Encoding
 Verbalor Visual
 Unique, distinctive, often involving imagery
 Requires greater effort

 Nonelaborative Encoding
 Rote, often involving repetitive rehearsal
 Not distinctive
 Less effort required
Retrieving Items from Long-Term Storage

 Recall
 No hints or cues supplied to guide retrieval

 Cued Recall
 Hints or cues supplied to guide retrieval

 Recognition
 Encoding context reinstated
Age and Retrieval

 Recall
 Older adults recall fewer items than young adults

 Cued recall
 Older adults may recall fewer items but age-related
difference smaller than it is for recall

 Recognition
 Little or no age-related differences
Remote Memory

 Factual Information
 Memory for political events, sports and entertainment information

 Autobiographical Information
 Memory for details of personal events such as proms, weddings, etc.
Forgetting

 Ribots Law: We forget newer information first – last in first out

 We are more likely to

remember older
memories

 Remote memories
are more robust
Reminiscence Bump
342
 Older adults’ strongest and most vivid memories
seem to be for events and experiences that
occurred between ages 10 and 30.

 This phenomenon seems to apply to both

factual and personal information.
Prospective Memory

 Definition: Remembering to do something in the

future

 Prospective memory studied in both laboratory and

naturalistic settings

 Two types of prospective memory-

 Event-based tasks- remembering to perform some action
in response to an external cue

 Time-based tasks- remembering to perform some action

without the aid of any external physical cue
Prospective Memory Task

Remind experimenter that a form must be signed at the end of testing

 100 participants, 10 age cohorts (35-80)
 Who do you think remembered more?
 What percentage of younger and older remembered?

 61% of subjects aged 35-45yrs remembered

 25% of subjects aged 70-80yrs remembered
Implicit Memory

 Unlike explicit memory, implicit memory is memory

without any deliberate recollection

 No conscious intention to remember when exposed to

stimuli or events

 No awareness that memory traces were encoded

 Implicit memory inferred when prior exposure affects

subsequent performance or behavior
Priming

Older adults:
 Show priming (perceptual, conceptual and
associative)
 Are less skilled at learning tasks
BUT..
 This effect can be abolished if presentation time
is slowed
Memory Training

 External mnemonics
 Usingphysical aids or cues to aid memory (iPads,
calendars, lists, medication organizers)

 Internal mnemonics
 Verbalor visual images to aid memory (acronyms,
rhymes, mental images)

 Often taught in memory training classes

Discourse Memory 352

 Memory for extended language materials

 Themes (gist)
 Details

 Off-line measures
 Individuals read/listen to language-related materials and
afterward take a memory test

 On-line measures
 Investigates strategies individuals use as they process
discourse materials
Memory Knowledge & Beliefs 357

 Metamemory
 An inherent understanding of memory

 Memory self-efficacy
 Beliefs and judgments about one’s own memory competence and
abilities

 Memory self-evaluation
 Older adults often report more frequent forgetting
 Older adults’ memory complaints are not always reflected in their
actual memory performance
Stereotypes about Memory and Aging

 Forgetting is expected to increase with age

 Older adults are expected to be forgetful

 Older adults’ memory difficulties are expected to

continue and not be resolved over time

 Older adults’ self-stereotypes about memory can affect

their actual memory performance
Attributions for Memory Failure 366

 Age-based double standard

 People attribute older adults’ forgetting to internal

stable factors (e.g., mental difficulty)

 People attribute young adults’ forgetting to internal

unstable factors (e.g., lack of effort)
Individual Differences

 Chronological Age
 In general, memory declines from the young-old to the oldest-old
years
 Gender
 Women show some advantage in episodic memory but this
more likely in cultures with egalitarian gender-role values
 Education and Lifestyle
 Older adults with more education and active lifestyles earn
higher scores on memory tests
 Health
 Older adults with better physical and mental health have higher
memory performance than those with difficulties
Summary on Memory

INTACT
 Priming DECLINES with age
 Semantic memory  Encoding: Less strategic when
encoding new information (i.e.,
 Episodic Memory for well-learned
grouping similar words)
life events
 Retrieval (when effortful)
 Recognition memory
 Uncued (free) recall
 Prospective memory in the real-
world  Autobiographical memories
become “fuzzier and rosier”
 Memory for positively valenced
stimuli  Prospective memory in the lab
 372 w comp and
selective Opl
Revisiting Models
Ecological