Older and wiser: Older adults’ episodic word memory benefits from sentence study contexts.

Matzen, Laura E.; Benjamin, Aaron S.

doi:10.1037/a0032945

Cited by 28 publications

(27 citation statements)

References 83 publications

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“…It is a question for future research to understand the possible interplay of biases here. Overall, this finding fits with a broad body of research demonstrating the supportive nature of older adults' knowledge on their memory performance (e.g., Badham, Hay, Foxon, Kaur, & Maylor, 2015;Castel, 2005;Hess, 1990Hess, , 2005Hess et al, 1989;Hess & Tate, 1992;Laurence, 1967aLaurence, , 1967bMatzen & Benjamin, 2013;Sitzman et al, 2015), but adds to it with evidence that the stability of access to their knowledge may be critical in older adults' application of what they know.…”

Section: Discussionsupporting

confidence: 78%

“…For instance, older adults continue to spell homophones (e.g., great/grate) in the most frequently used way (e.g., great), even after hearing a sentence that uses the infrequent form (e.g., grate), unlike younger adults (Howard, 1988). In fact, older adults' performance can improve significantly more (relative to any benefits that younger adults may experience) when knowledge is applicable, even extinguishing age differences in memory (e.g., Castel, 2005;Hess, Donley, & Vandermaas, 1989;Hess & Tate, 1992;Matzen & Benjamin, 2013). Thus, after encountering errors that contradict what they know, older adults may be more likely to use their stored knowledge, and thereby be protected from suggestibility, compared to their younger counterparts.…”

mentioning

confidence: 92%

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Age differences in suggestibility to contradictions of demonstrated knowledge: the influence of prior knowledge

Umanath

2016

Aging, Neuropsychology, and Cognition

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People maintain intact general knowledge into very old age and use it to support remembering. Interestingly, when older and younger adults encounter errors that contradict general knowledge, older adults suffer fewer memorial consequences: Older adults use fewer recently-encountered errors as answers for later knowledge questions. Why do older adults show this reduced suggestibility, and what role does their intact knowledge play? In three experiments, I examined suggestibility following exposure to errors in fictional stories that contradict general knowledge. Older adults consistently demonstrated more prior knowledge than younger adults but also gained access to even more across time. Additionally, they did not show a reduction in new learning from the stories, indicating lesser involvement of episodic memory failures. Critically, when knowledge was stably accessible, older adults relied more heavily on that knowledge compared to younger adults, resulting in reduced suggestibility. Implications for the broader role of knowledge in aging are discussed.

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Section: Discussionsupporting

confidence: 78%

mentioning

confidence: 92%

Age differences in suggestibility to contradictions of demonstrated knowledge: the influence of prior knowledge

Umanath

2016

Aging, Neuropsychology, and Cognition

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“…Experiences consistent with pre-existing larger schemata in semantic memory have been found to consolidate faster into a long-lasting memory trace relative to inconsistent ones [50,51]. Along these lines, older adults have been found to encode new material more efficiently than younger adults but only when the information is encapsulated in a context that is natural for the respective material, for instance, when a target word was placed within a meaningful sentence [52,53]. These results imply that older adults' exposure to past environments can also have an indirect influence on the mental lexicon by impacting how new information is encoded.…”

Section: Prior Knowledgementioning

confidence: 98%

New Perspectives on the Aging Lexicon

Wulff

Deyne

Jones

et al. 2019

Trends in Cognitive Sciences

116

126

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The field of cognitive aging has seen considerable advances in describing the linguistic and semantic changes that happen during the adult life span to uncover the structure of the mental lexicon (i.e., the mental repository of lexical and conceptual representations). Nevertheless, there is still debate concerning the sources of these changes, including the role of environmental exposure and several cognitive mechanisms associated with learning, representation, and retrieval of information. We review the current status of research in this field and outline a framework that promises to assess the contribution of both ecological and psychological aspects to the aging lexicon. Cognitive Aging and the Mental Lexicon There is consensus in the cognitive sciences that human development extends well beyond childhood and adolescence, and there has been remarkable empirical progress in the field of cognitive aging in past decades [1]. Nevertheless, the role of environmental and cognitive factors in age-related changes in the structure and processing of lexical and semantic representations (see Glossary) is still under debate. For example, age-related memory decline is commonly attributed to a decline in cognitive abilities [2,3], yet some researchers have proposed that massive exposure to language over the course of one's life leads to knowledge gains that may contribute to, if not fully account for, age-related memory deficits [4-6]. We argue that to resolve such debates we require an interdisciplinary approach that captures how information exposure across adulthood may change the way that we acquire, represent, and recall information. We summarize recent developments in the field (Figure 1, Table 1) and propose a conceptual framework (Figure 2, Key Figure) and associated research agenda that argues for combining ecological analyses, formal modeling, and large-scale empirical studies to shed light on the contents, structure, and neural basis of the aging mental lexicon in both health and disease. Mental Lexicon: Aging and Cognitive Performance The mental lexicon can be thought of as a repository of lexical and conceptual representations, composed of organized networks of semantic, phonological, orthographic, morphological, and other types of information [7]. The cognitive sciences have provided considerable knowledge about the computational (Box 1; [8-11]) and neural basis (Box 2; [12,13]) of lexical and semantic cognition, and there has been considerable interest in how such aspects of cognition change across adulthood and aging [14,15]. Past work on the aging lexicon emphasized the amount of information acquired across the life span (e.g., vocabulary gains across adulthood; [15]); however, new evaluations using graphbased approaches suggest that both quantity and structural aspects of representations differ between individuals [16] and change across the life span [17-19]. Such insights were gathered, for example, from a large-scale analysis of free association data from thousands of individuals [17], ranging from 10 to ...

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“…Moreover, memory and learning assessments usually feature a higher level of complexity and memory load and low applied (personal or work task) relevance. Such assessment often require participants to learn long word lists or paired associate words (Dunlosky et al, 2003) or involve data entry tasks Sharit, 1993, 1998) and recognition tests (Matzen and Benjamin, 2013). Many of these laboratory tests therefore call for participants to demonstrate maximal performance and extensive memorisation, rather than typical, "everyday" performance.…”

Section: The Cognitive Viewmentioning

confidence: 99%

Learning capability and performance in later working life: towards a contextual view

Jeske

Roßnagel

2015

Education + Training

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Purpose -The authors contribute to the literature by contrasting the cognitive with a contextual view on learning and development to address preconceptions about aging in order to broaden employers' views on learning and performance across the working life and careers of their employees. The authors furthermore identify a number of opportunities that exist to support and sustain learning capability and performance in older workers. The paper aims to discuss these issues. Design/methodology/approach -The authors conducted a selective literature search to identify literature that best exemplifies both the cognitive and contextual view. Findings -Age-related declines in performance are observed on very specific and limited tasks, unlikely to be encountered in the workplace. Due to its focus on assessing limits and age differences, such studies will not normally take experience, job and personal resources into account -these are more likely to be present in the workplace. The authors find that much of the more applied evidence suggests older workers can perform at a similar level to their younger colleagues -when the workplace or training context does not restrain them from using their own strategies and resources to complete tasks. Research limitations/implications -The current overview of research that is more representative of the more cognitive view outlines a number of issues regarding the transferability as well as generalisability of these well publicised findings. Many of the laboratory-based cognitive ageing research focuses on "testing the limits" of cognitive processing and efficiency. This paradigm is not compatible with the specific tasks and learning that takes place in the workplace, which led us to a more contextual view. Practical implications -The authors provide several starting points for broader and more inclusive training and development, particularly the role of supervisory practices, climate, self-efficacy and learning competency, resources and strategies. Originality/value -Taking a more contextual view may foster a re-evaluation of how inclusive current managerial practice, policies and current development initiatives are. Distinguishing job and personal resources can help in identifying the aspects that can be influenced by workers themselves and those aspects that are the primary responsibility of organisations and their managers.

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Older and wiser: Older adults’ episodic word memory benefits from sentence study contexts.

Cited by 28 publications

References 83 publications

Age differences in suggestibility to contradictions of demonstrated knowledge: the influence of prior knowledge

Age differences in suggestibility to contradictions of demonstrated knowledge: the influence of prior knowledge

New Perspectives on the Aging Lexicon

Learning capability and performance in later working life: towards a contextual view

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