Younger and older adults' attention to relevant and irrelevant stimuli in free recall

Pavur, Edward J.; Comeaux, Joan Marie; Zeringue, Janice Ann

doi:10.1080/03610738408258544

Cited by 6 publications

(4 citation statements)

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“…We concluded our search in February 2009. Studies were included (a) if they examined at least one sample of younger (mean age <30 years) and one sample of older (mean age >60 years) adults, (b) if the data were reported in a format amenable to meta-analysis (e.g., mean and standard deviation or standard error, F ratio, t test, standardized difference), (c) if the study was published in the English language in a peer-reviewed journal, (d) if the dependent measure pertained to episodic memory accuracy (this excluded studies that applied short-term-memory paradigms, typically yielding latency measures; Oberauer, 2001, 2005a, 2005b; Witthöft et al, 2009; Zacks et al, 1996, Experiment 3), and (e) if the scoring allowed for a comparison between TBR and TBF materials (this excluded Andrés, Van der Linden, & Parmentier, 2004; one experimental condition from Collette, Germain, et al, 2009; Collette, Schmidt, Scherrer, Adam, & Salmon, 2009; Pavur et al, 1984). The final sample consisted of 10 articles, containing 24 different experiments or independent participant groups; the studies are reported in Table 1.…”

Section: Methodsmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…2A, 2B; Zellner & Bäuml, 2006, Exp. 1-3); there are, however, exceptions to this pattern (Gamboz & Russo, 2002; Pavur, Comeaux, & Zeringue, 1984; Sahakyan et al, 2008a, Exp. 1, Exp 2: context change instructions; Zacks et al, 1996, Exp.…”

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confidence: 99%

“…A survey of the literature on directed forgetting and aging reveals, however, that the majority of studies showing age-related effects appear to be item-method studies (e.g., Collette, Germain, Hogge, & Van der Linden, 2009; Dulaney, Marks, & Link, 2004; Earles & Kersten, 2002; Hogge, Adam, & Collette, 2008; Salthouse, Siedlecki, & Krueger, 2006; Sego, Golding, & Gottlob, 2006, Experiment 1A; Witthöft, Sander, Süß, & Wittmann, 2009; Zacks et al, 1996, Experiments 1A and 1B). In list-method studies, age-related equivalence seem to prevail (e.g., Sahakyan, Delaney, & Goodmon, 2008, Experiments 1 and 2 with standard directed-forgetting instructions; Sego et al, 2006, Experiments 2A and 2B; Zellner & Bäuml, 2006, Experiments 1–3); there are, however, exceptions to this pattern (Gamboz & Russo, 2002; Pavur, Comeaux, & Zeringue, 1984; Sahakyan, Delaney, & Goodmon, 2008, Experiments 1 and 2 with context change instructions; Zacks et al, 1996, Experiments 2 and 3). One possible explanation for varying age-related effects in list-method studies is strategic behavior.…”

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Aging and directed forgetting in episodic memory: A meta-analysis.

Titz

Verhaeghen

2010

Psychology and Aging

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This meta-analysis examines the effects of aging on directed forgetting. A cue to forget is more effective in younger (d = 1.17) than in older adults (d = 0.81). Directed-forgetting effects were larger: (a) with the item method rather than the list method; (b) with longer presentation times; (c) with longer postcue rehearsal times; (d) with single words rather than verbal action phrases as stimuli; (e) with shorter lists; and (f) when recall rather than recognition was tested. Age effects were reliably larger when the item method was used, suggesting that these effects are mainly due to encoding differences.In this paper, we provide a meta-analytic overview of studies of aging and directed forgetting. The term forgetting often has a negative connotation, especially in the context of aging. Forgetting, however, is not always a failure of memory -sometimes forgetting is desirable. Imagine, for instance, that one of your colleagues has recently remarried, and you welcome her husband with the name of the man she just divorced. When performed intentionally, forgetting may prevent outdated information from interfering with the encoding and retrieval of currently relevant information. The experimental paradigm used most often to study intentional forgetting in episodic memory is the directed-forgetting paradigm (for reviews, see Johnson, 1994, andMacLeod, 1998). In the directed-forgetting paradigm, participants are presented with a set of items, some of which are cued to be remembered for a later memory test (these are labelled TBR items) and others that are cued to be forgotten (TBF items). Memory is unexpectedly tested for all items and is usually worse for TBF than TBR items.Directed forgetting has initially received some attention in the field of cognitive aging due to its ties to an inhibition account of age-related changes in memory (Hasher & Zacks, 1988;Hasher, Zacks, & May, 1999;Zacks, Radvansky, & Hasher, 1996;Zacks & Hasher, 1994). The inhibition theory claims that older adults have difficulties in inhibiting the processing of goal-irrelevant information (e.g., TBF-items). There are, however, several inhibitory and noninhibitory explanations of directed forgetting pointing at differences between cueing methods used in a study (Basden, Basden, & Gargano, 1993;Sahakyan & Foster, 2009 NIH-PA Author ManuscriptA cue to forget can be applied either on an item-by-item basis, that is, each word is individually cued as TBF or TBR, or to a whole list or block of items at once. In list-method studies a first list is presented followed by either a cue to forget or a cue to continue remembering this first list while studying a second list (Bjork, 1972;Block, 1971;Elmes, Adams, & Roediger, 1970;Muther, 1965). In item-method studies, the directed-forgetting effect usually refers to a within-subjects comparison; recall of TBF items is lower than recall of TBR items. In listmethod studies the directed-forgetting effect usually refers to a between-subjects comparison; forget-cue participants typically show impaired Li...

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Section: Methodsmentioning

confidence: 99%

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confidence: 99%

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confidence: 99%

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Aging and directed forgetting in episodic memory: A meta-analysis.

Titz

Verhaeghen

2010

Psychology and Aging

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“…Because such situations are likely to be common in the life experience of older as well as younger adults, it is perhaps surprising that the literature contains few studies of directed forgetting in older adults. The ones that we are aware of include a study that used the unusual procedure of cueing participants before study about the TBR-TBF status of individual items (Pavur, Comeaux, & Zeringue, 1984), a second that was reported at a conference and is briefly summarized in a book chapter (Camp & McKitrick, 1989), and a third that was the basis of another conference report (Giambra & Howard, 1994). Given this situation (few studies and incomplete reports of all but one), it seems premature to reach even tentative conclusions about directed forgetting effects in older adults without additional research.…”

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Studies of directed forgetting in older adults.

Zacks¹,

Radvansky²,

Hasher³

1996

Journal of Experimental Psychology: Learning, Memory, and Cogni

302

346

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Younger and older adults were compared in 4 directed forgetting experiments. These varied in the use of categorized versus unrelated word lists and in the use of item by item versus blocked remember-forget cueing procedures. Consistent with L. Hasher and R. T. Zacks's (1988) hypothesis of impaired inhibitory mechanisms in older adults, a variety of findings indicated that this age group is less able than yoimger adults to suppress the processing and retrieval of items designated as to be forgotten (TBF). Specifically, in comparison with younger adults, older adults produced more TBF word intrusions on an immediate recall test (Experiments 1A and 1B), took longer to reject TBF items (relative to a neutral baseline) on an immediate recognition test (Experiment 3), and recalled (Experiments 1A, 1B, and 2) and recognized (Experiments 1B and 2) relatively more TBF items on delayed retention tests in which all studied items were designated as targets.In this article, we present four experiments comparing the performance of younger and older adults on directed forgetting tasks. In this type of task (e.g., see Bjork, 1989), participants are presented items to study, some of which they are told to remember and others of which they are told to forget. Because the cueing as to which items are to be remembered (TBR items) and which are to be forgotten (TBF items) occurs after the items have been presented for study, participants must pay some attention to each item as it is presented. Thus, the directed forgetting paradigm investigates the ability to forget some inputs that one has recently attended to while at the same time remembering others presented in the same context and near the same time. To the degree that one is successful at this task, as younger adults generally are, the following trends are seen: The presence of TBF items on a list does not reduce recall or recognition of TBR items; there are few intrusions of TBF items when participants are asked to report only TBR items; and performance on TBF items is relatively poor when, on a later retention test, participants are asked to report TBF as well as TBR items.

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1985

Advances in Psychology

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Younger and older adults' attention to relevant and irrelevant stimuli in free recall

Cited by 6 publications

References 6 publications

Aging and directed forgetting in episodic memory: A meta-analysis.

Aging and directed forgetting in episodic memory: A meta-analysis.

Studies of directed forgetting in older adults.

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