In Response To PAR-03-056, Topic #15: Cognition in Context The ways that changes in background context (physical, mental, social, etc.) affect older adults' memory performance have received very little attention, despite extensive research with younger adults showing that memory is best when people are tested in an environment similar to the one they studied in. While older adults often use external aids to avoid forgetting, external aids are not always available, which may necessitate more reliance on memory. For example, therapists who treat patients in a hospital context complain that patients forget that training when they return home. Doctors give verbal instructions regarding the use of a medicine in the doctor's office, which may be forgotten upon arriving home due to the change of context. Although context changes may cause forgetting, this can be reversed either by returning physically to the original place of learning or by mentally recreating the context. Ultimately, the work will establish whether future research on reinstating contexts should be pursued to aid older adults' memory performance. The experiments will involve testing the memory for action phrases in older and younger adults either in a context that matches the one they studied in, or in a different context. Experiment 1 will manipulate physical context. Participants will learn a list of action phrases either in a home-like environment or in a room resembling medical office. They will then learn a second action list either in the same or new environmental context. A final recall test on both lists will then be administered in the final location. Experiment 2 focuses on mental context, because the ability to control and maintain mental contexts may vary across age. Participants learn two lists of actions. In the mental context change group, between the lists they perform a task designed to change their mental context. In the no-change group, the same amount of time will be filled with a task known not to change context. A final recall test is administered at the end of the experiment.
| Sahakyan, Lili; Delaney, Peter F; Goodmon, Leilani B (2008) Oh, honey, I already forgot that: strategic control of directed forgetting in older and younger adults. Psychol Aging 23:621-33 |
