Memory impairments and subjective complaints of memory loss are among the most common features of cognitive aging. The long-term goals of this project are to facilitate understanding the effects of aging on memory processes, and to provide a basis for developing techniques and interventions that can enhance memory functions of older adults in their everyday lives. The proposed experiments will contribute to these goals by clarifying the effects of aging on source memory (remembering when and where previous experiences occurred) and false memory (inaccurate recollections). The first specific aim is to evaluate the hypothesis that older adults can use a """"""""distinctiveness heuristic"""""""" - a strategy whereby participants demand access to distinctive recollections to support a positive memory decision - to reduce robust false recognition effects that are observed after participants study lists of semantically related words or categorized pictures. Experiments 1-6 test this hypothesis by manipulating conditions that do or do not allow participants to rely on a distinctiveness heuristic to reduce false recognition. The second specific aim is to extend the distinctiveness heuristic hypothesis to other forms of false recognition. This objective will be accomplished by examining the effects of distinctive encoding in a paradigm where false memory effects are created by repeating new items on a recognition test (Experiments 7-10) and by testing the hypothesis that younger adults will show greater """"""""false recognition reversal"""""""" than older adults because the effect depends on memory processes that are impaired in older adults, and cannot be produced by invoking a distinctiveness heuristic (Experiments 11-13). The third specific aim is to characterize source memory in older adults and examine its role in the generation and suppression of false memories. To do so, the investigators assess the hypothesis that memory for partial source information is preserved in older adults and can provide a basis for using the distinctiveness heuristic (Experiments 14-16), and also evaluate whether older adults can use a likelihood heuristic to reduce source memory errors (Experiment 17). The fourth specific aim, to evaluate the contribution of conceptual information to age-related increases in false recognition of categorized pictures and novel patterns, will be accomplished by attempting to interfere with verbal labeling (Experiment 18) and by manipulating the presence of verbal labels for novel visual patterns (Experiment 19). Taken together, the proposed studies will provide new insights into memory distortions that accompany aging and what can be done to minimize them.
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