A primary purpose of this work is to investigate the relationship between age and concentrative ability. Using a retrospective questionnaire Giambra has shown that older individuals, especially men, reported less distractibility, less mindwandering, and less boredom. Laboratory investigations are needed to confirm this apparent increased concentrative ability in the older population. An experimental procedure was developed where subjects are asked to repeat messages presented to one ear (shadowing) while ignoring simultaneous messages in the other ear. Greater concentrative ability is demonstrated by equivalent shadowing performance with and without simultaneous (and different) messages in the other ear. An experimental study using young (18-29), middle-aged (40-55) and old (65-85) subjects was begun. Preliminary results support the notion of greater concentrative ability, during shadowing, with the old subjects when compared with the young subjects. Efforts over the next fiscal year will include: (a) continuation of the present study's data collection until there are 30 subjects in each age group and (b) an investigation of the relationship among the difficulty of the shadowing task, age, and concentrative level.
