Certain aspects of memory (e.g., deliberate retrieval of recent events) decline with increasing age, whereas others (e.g., retrieval of factual knowledge, repetition priming) remain relatively intact. The purpose of this research is to investigate how this pattern of intact and impaired memory functioning affects older adults'judgment and decision making skills. Four series of studies involving different judgment tasks are proposed. The experiments in the first study focus on age differences in frequency judgment tasks that vary in the degree of """"""""precision"""""""" required in the retrieval of episodic evidence. The experiments in the second study examine aging effects in judgments of the frequency of co-occurrence of pairs of events and the influence that existing semantic relationships (e.g., stereotypes, normative word associations) and newly-formed associations have on these judgments. The experiments in the third study investigate the influence of repetition and outcome information on aging effects in judgments of validity for statements of uncertain truth value. The experiments in the fourth study focus on the retrieval of semantic and episodic evidence and aging effects in """"""""calibration"""""""" or the appropriateness of confidence in the accuracy of responses based on this evidence. The judgment tasks in these experiments are distinguished by whether an analytic (i.e., evidence must be deliberately retrieved) or nonanalytic (i.e., evidence influences judgment in the absence of deliberate recollection or awareness) judgment strategy is used (e.g., Jacoby, Kelley, Brown, & Jasechko, 1989) and by whether the primary evidence for the judgment is episodic (i.e., events experienced in the recent past) or semantic (i.e., general knowledge about the world, wellknown facts, associations, long-held beliefs, and stereotypes). We expect that age differences in judgment will be observed under conditions requiring an analytic judgment strategy and retrieval of episodic information, but not under conditions requiring retrieval of semantic information. Moreover, when the only possible strategy for judgment is nonanalytic, older and young adults'performance will be similar regardless of the source of the information. In addition to the experimental investigations of aging and judgment, we plan to develop a judgment and decision making questionnaire to acquire information on the perceptions older and young adults have of their own judgment processes.
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