Acoustics of Clear and Noise-Adapted Speech in Children, Young, and Older Adults

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Smiljanic, Rajka; Gilbert, Rachael C.

2017-01-01

Purpose: This study investigated acoustic-phonetic modifications produced in noise-adapted speech (NAS) and clear speech (CS) by children, young adults, and older adults. Method: Ten children (11-13 years of age), 10 young adults (18-29 years of age), and 10 older adults (60-84 years of age) read sentences in conversational and clear speaking…

Healthy older adults have insufficient hip range of motion and plantar flexor strength to walk like healthy young adults.

PubMed

Anderson, Dennis E; Madigan, Michael L

2014-03-21

Limited plantar flexor strength and hip extension range of motion (ROM) in older adults are believed to underlie common age-related differences in gait. However, no studies of age-related differences in gait have quantified the percentage of strength and ROM used during gait. We examined peak hip angles, hip torques and plantar flexor torques, and corresponding estimates of functional capacity utilized (FCU), which we define as the percentage of available strength or joint ROM used, in 10 young and 10 older healthy adults walking under self-selected and controlled (slow and fast) conditions. Older adults walked with about 30% smaller hip extension angle, 28% larger hip flexion angle, 34% more hip extensor torque in the slow condition, and 12% less plantar flexor torque in the fast condition than young adults. Older adults had higher FCU than young adults for hip flexion angle (47% vs. 34%) and hip extensor torque (48% vs. 27%). FCUs for plantar flexor torque (both age groups) and hip extension angle (older adults in all conditions; young adults in self-selected gait) were not significantly <100%, and were higher than for other measures examined. Older adults lacked sufficient hip extension ROM to walk with a hip extension angle as large as that of young adults. Similarly, in the fast gait condition older adults lacked the strength to match the plantar flexor torque produced by young adults. This supports the hypothesis that hip extension ROM and plantar flexor strength are limiting factors in gait and contribute to age-related differences in gait. Copyright © 2014 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

Cognitive tasks promote automatization of postural control in young and older adults.

PubMed

Potvin-Desrochers, Alexandra; Richer, Natalie; Lajoie, Yves

2017-09-01

Researchers looking at the effects of performing a concurrent cognitive task on postural control in young and older adults using traditional center-of-pressure measures and complexity measures found discordant results. Results of experiments showing improvements of stability have suggested the use of strategies such as automatization of postural control or stiffening strategy. This experiment aimed to confirm in healthy young and older adults that performing a cognitive task while standing leads to improvements that are due to automaticity of sway by using sample entropy. Twenty-one young adults and twenty-five older adults were asked to stand on a force platform while performing a cognitive task. There were four cognitive tasks: simple reaction time, go/no-go reaction time, equation and occurrence of a digit in a number sequence. Results demonstrated decreased sway area and variability as well as increased sample entropy for both groups when performing a cognitive task. Results suggest that performing a concurrent cognitive task promotes the adoption of an automatic postural control in young and older adults as evidenced by an increased postural stability and postural sway complexity. Copyright © 2017 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.

Factors influencing young adults' attitudes and knowledge of late-life sexuality among older women.

PubMed

Allen, Rebecca S; Petro, Kathryn N; Phillips, Laura L

2009-03-01

Although sexuality is valued throughout the lifespan, older women's sexual expression can be influenced by physical, mental and social factors, including attitudes and stereotypes held by younger generations. By gaining an understanding of what influences negative attitudes toward sexuality and beliefs about sexual consent capacity, the stigma associated with sexuality in late life may be reduced. Using vignette methodology in an online survey, we examined older women's health and young adults' (N = 606; mean age = 18.86, SD = 1.42, range 17-36) general knowledge and attitudes toward aging and sexuality, personal sexual behavior, religious beliefs and perceived closeness with an older adult on attitudes towards sexual behavior and perceptions of consent capacity among older women. The health status of older women proved important in determining young adults' acceptance and perception of sexual consent capacity regarding late-life heterosexual/autoerotic and homosexual behaviors. Specifically, young adults expressed lower acceptance and more doubt regarding capacity to consent to sexual expression when the older woman was described as cognitively impaired. Additionally, young adults' personal attitudes toward late-life sexuality, but not knowledge, predicted acceptance toward sexual expression and belief in sexual consent capacity. Attention toward the influence of older women's cognitive health and young adults' attitudes toward late-life sexuality may prove beneficial in designing interventions to decrease the stigma associated with sexual activity in later life.

Intelligibility of Noise-Adapted and Clear Speech in Child, Young Adult, and Older Adult Talkers

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Smiljanic, Rajka; Gilbert, Rachael C.

2017-01-01

Purpose: This study examined intelligibility of conversational and clear speech sentences produced in quiet and in noise by children, young adults, and older adults. Relative talker intelligibility was assessed across speaking styles. Method: Sixty-one young adult participants listened to sentences mixed with speech-shaped noise at -5 dB…

Measurement equivalence of the BDSx scale with young and older adults with bipolar disorder.

PubMed

O'Rourke, Norm; Bachner, Yaacov G; Canham, Sarah L; Sixsmith, Andrew; Study Team, Badas

2018-05-01

Instruments developed for mental health research are commonly devised and validated with young adults only. However, the measurement properties of these scales may differ over the lifespan. For this study, we set out to demonstrate the psychometric equivalence of the BDSx scale with an international sample of young and older adults with bipolar disorder (BD). We independently replicated the 4-factor model of BDSx responses with young and older participants (M = 45.63, range 19-87 years of age); we then compared the psychometric properties between models. This allowed us to compare responses to each BDSx item between groups, and the strength of association among depression and hypo/mania factors (cognitive depressive symptoms, somatic depressive symptoms, affrontive symptoms of hypo/mania, elation/loss of insight). Young and older adults responded to 19 of 20 BDSx items in similar ways. Only responses to the 'talkative' item were significantly higher for younger adults. Correlations between depression and mania factors are statistically indistinguishable between age groups. This suggests that symptoms cluster and present similarly for young and older adults with BD. The BDSx is currently being used for ecological momentary sampling of mood by the BADAS (Bipolar Affective Disorder and older Adults) Study app for iPhone. Copyright © 2017 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.

How name descriptiveness impacts proper name learning in young and older adults.

PubMed

Fogler, Kethera A; James, Lori E; Crandall, Elizabeth A

2010-09-01

To elucidate the impact of name descriptiveness and aging on learning new names, 26 young and 26 healthy older participants learned visibly-descriptive (e.g., Lengthy for a giraffe), psychologically-descriptive (e.g., Classy), and non-descriptive (e.g., Sam) proper names for previously-unknown cartoon characters. More visibly-descriptive names were learned than psychologically- or non-descriptive names, which did not differ from each other. There was also a differential benefit for older adults when the name was visibly-descriptive of the referent, such that older adults learned visibly-descriptive names as well as young adults but there were substantial age-related deficits in learning psychologically- and non-descriptive names.

Neural control of the lips differs for young and older adults following a perturbation

PubMed Central

de Miranda Marzullo, Ana Carolina; Neto, Osmar Pinto; Ballard, Kirrie J.; Robin, Donald A.; Chaitow, Lauren

2011-01-01

Aging impairs the control of many skilled movements including speech. The purpose of this paper was to investigate whether young and older adults adapt to lower lip perturbations during speech differently. Twenty men (10 young, 26 ± 3 years of age; 10 older, 60 ± 9 years of age) were requested to repeat the word (“papa”) 300 times. In 15% of the trials, the subjects experienced a mechanical perturbation on the lower lip. Displacement and neural activation (EMG) of the upper and lower lips were evaluated. Perturbations to the lower lip caused a greater increase in the maximum displacement of the lower lip for older adults compared with young adults (34.7 ± 19% vs. 13.4 ± 17%; P = 0.017). Furthermore, young adults exhibited significantly greater 30–100 Hz normalized EMG power for the lower lip compared to the upper lip (P < 0.005). In young adults, changes from normal to perturbed trials in the 30–50 Hz frequency band of the EMG were negatively correlated to the changes from normal to perturbed trials in the lower lip maximum displacement (R2 = 0.48; P = 0.025). It is concluded that young adults adapt better to lower lip perturbations compared with older adults and that the associated neural activation strategy of the involved muscle is different for the two age groups. PMID:20852991

Antimnemonic effects of schemas in young and older adults

PubMed Central

Badham, Stephen P.; Maylor, Elizabeth A.

2016-01-01

Schema-consistent material that is aligned with an individual’s knowledge and experience is typically more memorable than abstract material. This effect is often more extreme in older adults and schema use can alleviate age deficits in memory. In three experiments, young and older adults completed memory tasks where the availability of schematic information was manipulated. Specifying nonobvious relations between to-be-remembered word pairs paradoxically hindered memory (Experiment 1). Highlighting relations within mixed lists of related and unrelated word pairs had no effect on memory for those pairs (Experiment 2). This occurred even though related word pairs were recalled better than unrelated word pairs, particularly for older adults. Revealing a schematic context in a memory task with abstract image segments also hindered memory performance, particularly for older adults (Experiment 3). The data show that processing schematic information can come with costs that offset mnemonic benefits associated with schema-consistent stimuli. PMID:25980799

Metacognition for strategy selection during arithmetic problem-solving in young and older adults.

PubMed

Geurten, Marie; Lemaire, Patrick

2018-04-19

We examined participants' strategy choices and metacognitive judgments during arithmetic problem-solving. Metacognitive judgments were collected either prospectively or retrospectively. We tested whether metacognitive judgments are related to strategy choices on the current problems and on the immediately following problems, and age-related differences in relations between metacognition and strategy choices. Data showed that both young and older adults were able to make accurate retrospective, but not prospective, judgments. Moreover, the accuracy of retrospective judgments was comparable in young and older adults when participants had to select and execute the better strategy. Metacognitive accuracy was even higher in older adults when participants had to only select the better strategy. Finally, low-confidence judgments on current items were more frequently followed by better strategy selection on immediately succeeding items than high-confidence judgments in both young and older adults. Implications of these findings to further our understanding of age-related differences and similarities in adults' metacognitive monitoring and metacognitive regulation for strategy selection in the context of arithmetic problem solving are discussed.

Replicating distinctive facial features in lineups: identification performance in young versus older adults.

PubMed

Badham, Stephen P; Wade, Kimberley A; Watts, Hannah J E; Woods, Natalie G; Maylor, Elizabeth A

2013-04-01

Criminal suspects with distinctive facial features, such as tattoos or bruising, may stand out in a police lineup. To prevent suspects from being unfairly identified on the basis of their distinctive feature, the police often manipulate lineup images to ensure that all of the members appear similar. Recent research shows that replicating a distinctive feature across lineup members enhances eyewitness identification performance, relative to removing that feature on the target. In line with this finding, the present study demonstrated that with young adults (n = 60; mean age = 20), replication resulted in more target identifications than did removal in target-present lineups and that replication did not impair performance, relative to removal, in target-absent lineups. Older adults (n = 90; mean age = 74) performed significantly worse than young adults, identifying fewer targets and more foils; moreover, older adults showed a minimal benefit from replication over removal. This pattern is consistent with the associative deficit hypothesis of aging, such that older adults form weaker links between faces and their distinctive features. Although replication did not produce much benefit over removal for older adults, it was not detrimental to their performance. Therefore, the results suggest that replication may not be as beneficial to older adults as it is to young adults and demonstrate a new practical implication of age-related associative deficits in memory.

An Activation Likelihood Estimation Meta-Analysis Study of Simple Motor Movements in Older and Young Adults

PubMed Central

Turesky, Ted K.; Turkeltaub, Peter E.; Eden, Guinevere F.

2016-01-01

The functional neuroanatomy of finger movements has been characterized with neuroimaging in young adults. However, less is known about the aging motor system. Several studies have contrasted movement-related activity in older versus young adults, but there is inconsistency among their findings. To address this, we conducted an activation likelihood estimation (ALE) meta-analysis on within-group data from older adults and young adults performing regularly paced right-hand finger movement tasks in response to external stimuli. We hypothesized that older adults would show a greater likelihood of activation in right cortical motor areas (i.e., ipsilateral to the side of movement) compared to young adults. ALE maps were examined for conjunction and between-group differences. Older adults showed overlapping likelihoods of activation with young adults in left primary sensorimotor cortex (SM1), bilateral supplementary motor area, bilateral insula, left thalamus, and right anterior cerebellum. Their ALE map differed from that of the young adults in right SM1 (extending into dorsal premotor cortex), right supramarginal gyrus, medial premotor cortex, and right posterior cerebellum. The finding that older adults uniquely use ipsilateral regions for right-hand finger movements and show age-dependent modulations in regions recruited by both age groups provides a foundation by which to understand age-related motor decline and motor disorders. PMID:27799910

Direct and extended intergenerational contact and young people's attitudes towards older adults.

PubMed

Drury, Lisbeth; Hutchison, Paul; Abrams, Dominic

2016-09-01

Research suggests that positive intergenerational contact can improve young people's attitudes towards older adults. However, today's age-segregated society may not provide ample opportunities for positive contact between younger and older adults to occur on a regular basis. In three studies, we investigated whether the positive attitudinal outcomes associated with direct contact might also stem from a more indirect form of intergenerational relationship: extended contact. In Study 1 (N = 70), extended contact was associated with more positive attitudes towards older adults even when controlling for direct intergenerational contact (contact frequency and contact quality). In Study 2 (N = 110), the positive effects of direct and extended contact on young people's age-related attitudes were mediated by reductions in intergroup anxiety and ageing anxiety. The mediational effects of intergroup anxiety were replicated in Study 3 (N = 95) and ingroup norms additionally emerged as a mediator of the positive effects of extended contact on young people's attitudes towards older adults. Discussion focuses on the implications for strategies aimed at tackling ageism. ©2016 The Authors. British Journal of Social Psychology published by John Wiley & Sons Ltd on behalf of British Psychological Society.

Mindfulness and emotion regulation in older and young adults.

PubMed

Prakash, Ruchika Shaurya; Whitmoyer, Patrick; Aldao, Amelia; Schirda, Brittney

2017-01-01

Research shows that dispositional mindfulness is associated with metrics of overall well-being, with enhanced emotion regulation potentially underlying these salutary effects. However, the role of regulation strategy use remains poorly understood. In this study, we examined age-variant associations between dispositional mindfulness, emotion regulation strategies, and emotion dysregulation. Self-report data were collected from 50 older and 50 young adults on mindfulness, emotion dysregulation, and recent strategy use. For the current study, we examined if cognitive reappraisal, experiential suppression, and thought avoidance use mediated the association between mindfulness and emotion dysregulation. Thought avoidance, but not reappraisal or suppression strategies, partially mediated the association between mindfulness and emotion dysregulation. Age group moderated the observed mediation, such that for young adults, lower mindfulness was associated with greater use of thought avoidance, and in turn with greater emotion dysregulation (e.g., difficulties engaging in goal-directed behavior in the face of strong emotions). The current cross-sectional study suggests that reduced avoidance of thoughts may partially explain the relationship between trait mindfulness and enhanced emotion regulation, with this mediational pathway being stronger for young compared with older adults.

The Effects of an Afternoon Nap on Episodic Memory in Young and Older Adults

PubMed Central

Fairley, Jacqueline; Decker, Michael J.; Bliwise, Donald L.

2017-01-01

Abstract Study Objectives: In young adults, napping is hypothesized to benefit episodic memory retention (eg, via consolidation). Whether this relationship is present in older adults has not been adequately tested but is an important question because older adults display marked changes in sleep and memory. Design: Between-subjects design. Setting: Sleep laboratory at Emory University School of Medicine. Participants: Fifty healthy young adults (18–29) and 45 community-dwelling older adults (58–83). Intervention: Participants were randomly assigned to a 90-minute nap opportunity or an equal interval of quiet wakefulness. Measurements and Results: Participants underwent an item-wise directed forgetting learning procedure in which they studied words that were individually followed by the instruction to “remember” or “forget.” Following a 90-minute retention interval filled with quiet wakefulness or a nap opportunity, they were asked to free recall and recognize those words. Young adults retained significantly more words following a nap interval than a quiet wakefulness interval on both free recall and recognition tests. There was modest evidence for greater nap-related retention of “remember” items relative to “forget” items for free recall but not recognition. Older adults’ memory retention did not differ across nap and quiet wakefulness conditions, although they demonstrated greater fragmentation, lower N3, and lower rapid eye movement duration than the young adults. Conclusions: In young adults, an afternoon nap benefits episodic memory retention, but such benefits decrease with advancing age. PMID:28329381

Ageist attitudes block young adults' ability for compassion toward incapacitated older adults.

PubMed

Bergman, Yoav S; Bodner, Ehud

2015-09-01

Upon encountering older adults, individuals display varying degrees of prosocial attitudes and behaviors. While some display compassion and empathy, others draw away and wish to maintain their distance from them. The current study examined if and how ageist attitudes influence the association between the sight of physical incapacity in older age and compassionate reactions toward them. We predicted that ageist attitudes would interfere with the ability to respond to them with compassion. Young adults (N = 149, ages 19-29) were randomly distributed into two experimental conditions, each viewing a short video portraying different aspects of older adult physicality; one group viewed older adults displaying incapacitated behavior, and the other viewed fit behavior. Participants subsequently filled out scales assessing aging anxieties, and ageist and compassionate attitudes. Ageism was associated with reduced compassion toward the figures. Moreover, viewing incapacitated older adults led to increased concern toward them and perceived efficacy in helping them. However, significant interactions proved that higher scores of ageism in response to the videos led to increased need for distance and reduced efficacy toward incapacitated adults, an effect not observed among subjects with lower ageism scores. Ageism seems to be a factor which disengages individuals from older adults displaying fragility, leading them to disregard social norms which dictate compassion. The results are discussed from the framework of terror management theory, as increased mortality salience and death-related thoughts could have led to the activation of negative attitudes which, in turn, reduce compassion.

When the mind wanders: Distinguishing stimulus-dependent from stimulus-independent thoughts during incidental encoding in young and older adults.

PubMed

Maillet, David; Schacter, Daniel L

2016-06-01

In recent years, several studies have indicated that healthy older adults exhibit a reduction in mind-wandering compared with young adults. However, relatively little research has examined the extent to which ongoing thoughts in young and older adults are dependent on environmental stimuli. In the current study, we assessed age-related differences in frequency of stimulus-dependent thoughts (SDTs) and stimulus-independent thoughts (SITs) during a slow-paced incidental encoding task. Based on previous research suggesting that older adults rely on external information to a greater extent than young adults, we hypothesized that ongoing thoughts in older adults may be more stimulus-dependent than in young adults. We found that although older adults reported overall fewer thoughts compared to young adults, they exhibited a reduction in proportion of SITs and an increase in proportion of SDTs. In both age groups, SDTs were more frequently about the past compared with SITs, while SITs were more frequently about the future. Finally, the extent to which both young and older adults reported SDTs, but not SITs, at encoding was positively correlated with how often they reported remembering thoughts at retrieval, and SDT frequency was positively correlated with overall performance on the memory task in older adults. Our results provide evidence that ongoing thoughts in older adults may be more dependent on environmental stimuli than young adults, and that these thoughts may impact performance in recognition tasks. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2016 APA, all rights reserved).

Neural correlates of cued recall in young and older adults: an event-related potential study.

PubMed

Angel, Lucie; Fay, Séverine; Bouazzaoui, Badiâa; Granjon, Lionel; Isingrini, Michel

2009-01-07

This experiment investigated age differences in electrophysiological correlates of retrieval success in a word-stem cued recall task. Young adults (M+/-SD: 21.4 years+/-1.9) performed this memory task more accurately than older participants (M+/-SD: 65.1 years+/-3.3). Robust event-related brain potential (ERP) old/new effects were identified in both age groups. The main age differences were observed in latency and lateralization of ERP effects. Young adults exhibited a parietal effect that became focused over left parietal electrodes, whereas no asymmetry was observed in older adults. Moreover, ERP effects were more delayed in the older group. Overall, these findings provide some evidence of the reduction of processing speed during aging and suggest that young and older adults may recruit distinct cerebral patterns during episodic cued recall.

Greater Perceived Similarity between Self and Own-Age Others in Older than Young Adults

PubMed Central

Lin, Tian; Ankudowich, Elizabeth; Ebner, Natalie C.

2017-01-01

As people age, they increasingly incorporate age-stereotypes into their self-view. Based on this evidence we propose that older compared to young adults identify to a greater extent with their own-age group on personality traits, an effect that may be particularly pronounced for positive traits. Two studies tested these hypotheses by examining associations in young and older adults between evaluations of self and own-age others on personality traits that varied on valence. In both studies, young and older participants rated personality trait adjectives on age typicality, valence, and self typicality. Converging results across both studies showed that older compared to young participants were more likely to endorse personality traits as self-typical when those traits were also perceived as more typical for their own-age group, independent of whether age was made salient to participants prior to evaluation. In addition, there was evidence that the association between evaluations of self and own-age others in older participants was greater for more positive personality traits. This age-differential pattern is discussed in the context of increased age salience in aging and its effect on the similarity between evaluations of self and own-age others in older compared to young adults. PMID:28471216

Comparing young and older adults' perceptions of conflicting stereotypes and multiply-categorizable individuals.

PubMed

Kang, Sonia K; Chasteen, Alison L; Cadieux, Jonathan; Cary, Lindsey A; Syeda, Maisha

2014-09-01

Individuals can be simultaneously categorized into multiple social groups (e.g., racial, gender, age), and stereotypes about one social group may conflict with another. Two such conflicting stereotype sets are those associated with older adults (e.g., frail, kind) and with Black people (e.g., violent, hostile). Recent research shows that young adult perceivers evaluate elderly Black men more positively than young Black men, suggesting that components of the elderly stereotype moderate the influence of conflicting Black stereotypes (Kang & Chasteen, 2009). The current research begins to examine whether this pattern of perceiving multiply-categorizable individuals is maintained among older adults or altered, perhaps due to aging-related cognitive and motivational changes. In three studies using different targets and evaluative tasks, both young and older participants showed evidence of an interplay between Black and elderly stereotypes, such that they perceived elderly Black targets more positively than young Black targets. A similar pattern was observed when assessing emotion change (Study 1), making ratings of warmth and power in the past, present, and future (Study 2), and when directly comparing young and old Black and White targets on traits related to warmth and power (Study 3). The absence of age differences suggests that evaluation of multiply-categorizable targets follows comparable underlying patterns of stereotype activation and inhibition in younger and older adults. PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2014 APA, all rights reserved.

Prospective memory in young and older adults: the effects of task importance and ongoing task load.

PubMed

Smith, Rebekah E; Hunt, R Reed

2014-01-01

Remembering to perform an action in the future, called prospective memory, often shows age-related differences in favor of young adults when tested in the laboratory. Recently Smith, Horn, and Bayen (2012; Aging, Neuropsychology, and Cognition, 19, 495) embedded a PM task in an ongoing color-matching task and manipulated the difficulty of the ongoing task by varying the number of colors on each trial of the task. Smith et al. found that age-related differences in PM performance (lower PM performance for older adults relative to young adults) persisted even when older adults could perform the ongoing task as well or better than the young adults. The current study investigates a possible explanation for the pattern of results reported by Smith et al. by including a manipulation of task emphasis: for half of the participants the prospective memory task was emphasize, while for the other half the ongoing color-matching task was emphasized. Older adults performed a 4-color version of the ongoing color-matching task, while young adults completed either the 4-color or a more difficult 6-color version of the ongoing task. Older adults failed to perform as well as the young adults on the prospective memory task regardless of task emphasis, even when older adults were performing as well or better than the young adults on the ongoing color-matching task. The current results indicate that the lack of an effect of ongoing task load on prospective memory task performance is not due to a perception that one or the other task is more important than the other.

Working memory capacity and overgeneral autobiographical memory in young and older adults.

PubMed

Ros, Laura; Latorre, José Miguel; Serrano, Juan Pedro

2010-01-01

The objectives of this study are to compare the Autobiographical Memory Test (AMT) performance of two healthy samples of younger and older adults and to analyse the relationship between overgeneral memory (OGM) and working memory executive processes (WMEP) using a structural equation modelling with latent variables. The AMT and sustained attention, short-term memory and working memory tasks were administered to a group of young adults (N = 50) and a group of older adults (N = 46). On the AMT, the older adults recalled a greater number of categorical memories (p = .000) and fewer specific memories (p = .000) than the young adults, confirming that OGM occurs in the normal population and increases with age. WMEP was measured by reading span and a working memory with sustained attention load task. Structural equation modelling reflects that WMEP shows a strong relationship with OGM: lower scores on WMEP reflect an OGM phenomenon characterized by higher categorical and lower specific memories.

A close relationship between verbal memory and SN/VTA integrity in young and older adults.

PubMed

Düzel, Sandra; Schütze, Hartmut; Stallforth, Sabine; Kaufmann, Jörn; Bodammer, Nils; Bunzeck, Nico; Münte, Thomas F; Lindenberger, Ulman; Heinze, Hans-Jochen; Düzel, Emrah

2008-11-01

Age-related dysfunction in dopaminergic neuromodulation is assumed to contribute to age-associated memory impairment. However, to date there are no in vivo data on how structural parameters of the substantia nigra/ventral tegmental area (SN/VTA), the main origin of dopaminergic projections, relate to memory performance in healthy young and older adults. We investigated this relationship in a cross-sectional study including data from the hippocampus and frontal white matter (FWM) and also assessing working memory span and attention. In groups of young and older adults matched for the variance of their age distribution, gender and body mass index, we observed a robust positive correlation between Magnetization Transfer Ratio (MTR)--a measure of structural integrity--of the SN/VTA and FWM with verbal learning and memory performance among older adults, while there was a negative correlation in the young. Two additional imaging parameters, anisotropy of diffusion and diffusion coefficient, suggested that in older adults FWM changes reflected vascular pathology while SN/VTA changes pointed towards neuronal loss and loss of water content. The negative correlation in the young possibly reflected maturational changes. Multiple regression analyses indicated that in both young and older adults, SN/VTA MTR explained more variance of verbal learning and memory than FWM MTR or hippocampal MTR, and contributed less to explaining variance of working memory span. Together these findings indicate that structural integrity in the SN/VTA has a relatively selective impact on verbal learning and memory and undergoes specific changes from young adulthood to older age that qualitatively differ from changes in the FWM and hippocampus.

Associative memory advantage in grapheme-color synesthetes compared to older, but not young adults

PubMed Central

Pfeifer, Gaby; Rothen, Nicolas; Ward, Jamie; Chan, Dennis; Sigala, Natasha

2014-01-01

People with grapheme-color synesthesia perceive enriched experiences of colors in response to graphemes (letters, digits). In this study, we examined whether these synesthetes show a generic associative memory advantage for stimuli that do not elicit a synesthetic color. We used a novel between group design (14 young synesthetes, 14 young, and 14 older adults) with a self-paced visual associative learning paradigm and subsequent retrieval (immediate and delayed). Non-synesthesia inducing, achromatic fractal pair-associates were manipulated in visual similarity (high and low) and corresponded to high and low memory load conditions. The main finding was a learning and retrieval advantage of synesthetes relative to older, but not to younger, adults. Furthermore, the significance testing was supported with effect size measures and power calculations. Differences between synesthetes and older adults were found during dissimilar pair (high memory load) learning and retrieval at immediate and delayed stages. Moreover, we found a medium size difference between synesthetes and young adults for similar pair (low memory load) learning. Differences between young and older adults were also observed during associative learning and retrieval, but were of medium effect size coupled with low power. The results show a subtle associative memory advantage in synesthetes for non-synesthesia inducing stimuli, which can be detected against older adults. They also indicate that perceptual mechanisms (enhanced in synesthesia, declining as part of the aging process) can translate into a generic associative memory advantage, and may contribute to associative deficits accompanying healthy aging. PMID:25071664

Dual Task Costs of Oral Reading for Young versus Older Adults

PubMed Central

Kemper, Susan; Bontempo, Daniel; Schmalzried, RaLynn; McKedy, Whitney; Tagliaferri, Bruno; Kieweg, Doug

2013-01-01

A digital pursuit rotor was used to monitor oral reading costs by time-locking tracking performance to the auditory wave form produced as young and older adults were reading out short paragraphs. Multilevel modeling was used to determine how paragraph-level predictors of length, grammatical complexity, and readability and person-level predictors such as speaker age or working memory capacity predicted reading and tracking performance. In addition, sentence-by-sentence variation in tracking performance was examined during the production of individual sentences and during the pauses before upcoming sentences. The results suggest that dual tasking has a greater impact on older adults’ reading comprehension and tracking performance. At the level of individual sentences, young and older adults adopt different strategies to deal with grammatically complex and propositionally dense sentences. PMID:23463405

Immediate effects of transcutaneous electrical stimulation on physiological swallowing effort in older versus young adults.

PubMed

Berretin-Felix, Giédre; Sia, Isaac; Barikroo, Ali; Carnaby, Giselle D; Crary, Michael A

2016-09-01

This study compared the immediate impact of different transcutaneous electrical stimulation (TES) amplitudes on physiological swallowing effort in healthy older adults versus young adults. Swallowing physiology changes with age. Reduced physiological swallowing effort in older adults including lower lingua-palatal and pharyngeal pressures may increase risk for swallowing dysfunction (i.e. dysphagia). Transcutaneous electrical stimulation (TES) has been advocated as an adjunctive modality to enhance outcomes in exercise-based therapy for individuals with dysphagia. However, significant variation in how TES is applied during therapy remains and the physiological swallowing response to TES is poorly studied, especially in older adults. Physiological change in swallowing associated with no stimulation, sensory stimulation and motor stimulation was compared in 20 young adults versus 14 older adults. Lingua-palatal and pharyngeal manometric pressures assessed physiological swallowing effort. Multivariate analyses identified interactions between age and stimulation amplitude on lingual and pharyngeal functions. Motor stimulation reduced anterior tongue pressure in both age groups but selectively reduced posterior lingua-palatal pressures in young adults only. Sensory stimulation increased base of tongue (BOT) pressures in older adults but decreased BOT pressures in young adults. Motor stimulation increased hypopharyngeal pressures in both groups. Age and TES level interact in determining immediate physiological responses on swallow performance. A one-size-fit-all approach to TES in dysphagia rehabilitation may be misdirected. © 2014 John Wiley & Sons A/S and The Gerodontology Association. Published by John Wiley & Sons Ltd.

Cancer in Older Adults

MedlinePlus

... Home > Navigating Cancer Care > For Older Adults For Older Adults A full-text transcript is available. More than ... Advanced Cancer For Children For Teens For Young Adults For Older Adults Aging and Cancer Cancer Care Decisions for ...

Text as a Supplement to Speech in Young and Older Adults a)

PubMed Central

Krull, Vidya; Humes, Larry E.

2015-01-01

Objective The purpose of this experiment was to quantify the contribution of visual text to auditory speech recognition in background noise. Specifically, we tested the hypothesis that partially accurate visual text from an automatic speech recognizer could be used successfully to supplement speech understanding in difficult listening conditions in older adults, with normal or impaired hearing. Our working hypotheses were based on what is known regarding audiovisual speech perception in the elderly from speechreading literature. We hypothesized that: 1) combining auditory and visual text information will result in improved recognition accuracy compared to auditory or visual text information alone; 2) benefit from supplementing speech with visual text (auditory and visual enhancement) in young adults will be greater than that in older adults; and 3) individual differences in performance on perceptual measures would be associated with cognitive abilities. Design Fifteen young adults with normal hearing, fifteen older adults with normal hearing, and fifteen older adults with hearing loss participated in this study. All participants completed sentence recognition tasks in auditory-only, text-only, and combined auditory-text conditions. The auditory sentence stimuli were spectrally shaped to restore audibility for the older participants with impaired hearing. All participants also completed various cognitive measures, including measures of working memory, processing speed, verbal comprehension, perceptual and cognitive speed, processing efficiency, inhibition, and the ability to form wholes from parts. Group effects were examined for each of the perceptual and cognitive measures. Audiovisual benefit was calculated relative to performance on auditory-only and visual-text only conditions. Finally, the relationship between perceptual measures and other independent measures were examined using principal-component factor analyses, followed by regression analyses. Results

Test-retest reliability of sensor-based sit-to-stand measures in young and older adults.

PubMed

Regterschot, G Ruben H; Zhang, Wei; Baldus, Heribert; Stevens, Martin; Zijlstra, Wiebren

2014-01-01

This study investigated test-retest reliability of sensor-based sit-to-stand (STS) peak power and other STS measures in young and older adults. In addition, test-retest reliability of the sensor method was compared to test-retest reliability of the Timed Up and Go Test (TUGT) and Five-Times-Sit-to-Stand Test (FTSST) in older adults. Ten healthy young female adults (20-23 years) and 31 older adults (21 females; 73-94 years) participated in two assessment sessions separated by 3-8 days. Vertical peak power was assessed during three (young adults) and five (older adults) normal and fast STS trials with a hybrid motion sensor worn on the hip. Older adults also performed the FTSST and TUGT. The average sensor-based STS peak power of the normal STS trials and the average sensor-based STS peak power of the fast STS trials showed excellent test-retest reliability in young adults (intra-class correlation (ICC)≥0.90; zero in 95% confidence interval of mean difference between test and retest (95%CI of D); standard error of measurement (SEM)≤6.7% of mean peak power) and older adults (ICC≥0.91; zero in 95%CI of D; SEM≤9.9%). Test-retest reliability of sensor-based STS peak power and TUGT (ICC=0.98; zero in 95%CI of D; SEM=8.5%) was comparable in older adults, test-retest reliability of the FTSST was lower (ICC=0.73; zero outside 95%CI of D; SEM=14.4%). Sensor-based STS peak power demonstrated excellent test-retest reliability and may therefore be useful for clinical assessment of functional status and fall risk. Copyright © 2014 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.

Do Alternative Names Block Young and Older Adults' Retrieval of Proper Names?

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Cross, Emily S.; Burke, Deborah M.

2004-01-01

This study evaluates whether tip of the tongue experiences (TOTs) are caused by a more accessible word which blocks retrieval of the target word, especially for older adults. In a ''competitor priming'' paradigm, young and older adults produced the name of a famous character (e.g., Eliza Doolittle) in response to a question and subsequently named…

Rejecting familiar distracters during recognition in young adults with traumatic brain injury and in healthy older adults.

PubMed

Ozen, Lana J; Skinner, Erin I; Fernandes, Myra A

2010-05-01

The most common cognitive complaint reported by healthy older adults and young adults with traumatic brain injury (TBI) is memory difficulties. We investigated the effects of normal aging and the long-term effects of TBI in young adults on the susceptibility to incorrectly endorse distracter information on a memory test. Prior to a study phase, participants viewed a "pre-exposure" list containing distracter words, presented once or three times, and half of the target study words. Subsequently, during the study phase, all target words were presented such that, across lists, study words were viewed either once or three times. On the recognition test, TBI and older adult participants were more likely to falsely endorse "pre-exposed" distracter words viewed three times as being from the target study list, compared to non-head-injured young controls. Normal aging and head injury in young may similarly compromise one's ability to reject highly familiar, but distracting, information during recognition. Older adult and TBI participants were also slower to complete the Trail Making task and had poorer output on a Digit Span task, suggesting these two populations share a deficit in executive function and working memory. Similar changes in frontal lobe function may underlie these shared cognitive deficits.

An episodic specificity induction enhances means-end problem solving in young and older adults.

PubMed

Madore, Kevin P; Schacter, Daniel L

2014-12-01

Episodic memory plays an important role not only in remembering past experiences, but also in constructing simulations of future experiences and solving means-end social problems. We recently found that an episodic specificity induction-brief training in recollecting details of past experiences-enhances performance of young and older adults on memory and imagination tasks. Here we tested the hypothesis that this specificity induction would also positively impact a means-end problem-solving task on which age-related changes have been linked to impaired episodic memory. Young and older adults received the specificity induction or a control induction before completing a means-end problem-solving task, as well as memory and imagination tasks. Consistent with previous findings, older adults provided fewer relevant steps on problem solving than did young adults, and their responses also contained fewer internal (i.e., episodic) details across the 3 tasks. There was no difference in the number of other (e.g., irrelevant) steps on problem solving or external (i.e., semantic) details generated on the 3 tasks as a function of age. Critically, the specificity induction increased the number of relevant steps and internal details (but not other steps or external details) that both young and older adults generated in problem solving compared with the control induction, as well as the number of internal details (but not external details) generated for memory and imagination. Our findings support the idea that episodic retrieval processes are involved in means-end problem solving, extend the range of tasks on which a specificity induction targets these processes, and show that the problem-solving performance of older adults can benefit from a specificity induction as much as that of young adults. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2014 APA, all rights reserved).

An episodic specificity induction enhances means-end problem solving in young and older adults

PubMed Central

Madore, Kevin P.; Schacter, Daniel L.

2014-01-01

Episodic memory plays an important role not only in remembering past experiences, but also in constructing simulations of future experiences and solving means-end social problems. We recently found that an episodic specificity induction- brief training in recollecting details of past experiences- enhances performance of young and older adults on memory and imagination tasks. Here we tested the hypothesis that this specificity induction would also positively impact a means-end problem solving task on which age-related changes have been linked to impaired episodic memory. Young and older adults received the specificity induction or a control induction before completing a means-end problem solving task as well as memory and imagination tasks. Consistent with previous findings, older adults provided fewer relevant steps on problem solving than did young adults, and their responses also contained fewer internal (i.e., episodic) details across the three tasks. There was no difference in the number of other (e.g., irrelevant) steps on problem solving or external (i.e., semantic) details generated on the three tasks as a function of age. Critically, the specificity induction increased the number of relevant steps and internal details (but not other steps or external details) that both young and older adults generated in problem solving compared with the control induction, as well as the number of internal details (but not external details) generated for memory and imagination. Our findings support the idea that episodic retrieval processes are involved in means-end problem solving, extend the range of tasks on which a specificity induction targets these processes, and show that the problem solving performance of older adults can benefit from a specificity induction as much as that of young adults. PMID:25365688

Effect of Repetition Lag on Priming of Unfamiliar Visual Objects in Young and Older Adults

PubMed Central

Gordon, Leamarie T.; Soldan, Anja; Thomas, Ayanna K.; Stern, Yaakov

2013-01-01

Across three experiments, we examined the effect of repetition lag on priming of unfamiliar visual objects in healthy young and older adults. Multiple levels of lag were examined, ranging from short (one to four intervening stimuli) to long (50+ intervening stimuli). In each experiment, subjects viewed a series of new and repeated line drawings of objects and decided whether they depicted structurally possible or impossible figures. Experiment 1 and 2 found similar levels of priming in young and older adults at short and medium lags. At the longer repetition lags (∼20+ intervening stimuli), older adults showed less overall priming, as measured by reaction time facilitation, than young adults. This indicates that older adults can rapidly encode unfamiliar three-dimensional objects to support priming at shorter lags; however, they cannot maintain these representations over longer intervals. In addition to repetition lag, we also explored the relationship between priming and cognitive reserve, as measured by education and verbal intelligence. In the older adults, higher levels of cognitive reserve were associated with greater reaction time priming, suggesting that cognitive reserve may mediate the relationship between aging and priming. PMID:23276220

Situation Model Updating in Young and Older Adults: Global versus Incremental Mechanisms

PubMed Central

Bailey, Heather R.; Zacks, Jeffrey M.

2015-01-01

Readers construct mental models of situations described by text. Activity in narrative text is dynamic, so readers must frequently update their situation models when dimensions of the situation change. Updating can be incremental, such that a change leads to updating just the dimension that changed, or global, such that the entire model is updated. Here, we asked whether older and young adults make differential use of incremental and global updating. Participants read narratives containing changes in characters and spatial location and responded to recognition probes throughout the texts. Responses were slower when probes followed a change, suggesting that situation models were updated at changes. When either dimension changed, responses to probes for both dimensions were slowed; this provides evidence for global updating. Moreover, older adults showed stronger evidence of global updating than did young adults. One possibility is that older adults perform more global updating to offset reduced ability to manipulate information in working memory. PMID:25938248

The effects of memory training on behavioral and microstructural plasticity in young and older adults

PubMed Central

Bråthen, Anne Cecilie Sjøli; Rohani, Darius A.; Grydeland, Håkon; Fjell, Anders M.; Walhovd, Kristine B.

2017-01-01

Abstract Age differences in human brain plasticity are assumed, but have not been systematically investigated. In this longitudinal study, we investigated changes in white matter (WM) microstructure in response to memory training relative to passive and active control conditions in 183 young and older adults. We hypothesized that (i) only the training group would show improved memory performance and microstructural alterations, (ii) the young adults would show larger memory improvement and a higher degree of microstructural alterations as compared to the older adults, and (iii) changes in memory performance would relate to microstructural alterations. The results showed that memory improvement was specific to the training group, and that both the young and older participants improved their performance. The young group improved their memory to a larger extent compared to the older group. In the older sample, the training group showed less age‐related decline in WM microstructure compared to the control groups, in areas overlapping the corpus callosum, the cortico‐spinal tract, the cingulum bundle, the superior longitudinal fasciculus, and the anterior thalamic radiation. Less microstructural decline was related to a higher degree of memory improvement. Despite individual adaptation securing sufficient task difficulty, no training‐related group differences in microstructure were found in the young adults. The observed divergence of behavioral and microstructural responses to memory training with age is discussed within a supply‐demand framework. The results demonstrate that plasticity is preserved into older age, and that microstructural alterations may be part of a neurobiological substrate for behavioral improvements in older adults. Hum Brain Mapp 38:5666–5680, 2017. © 2018 The Authors Human Brain Mapping Published byWiley Periodicals, Inc. PMID:28782901

Emotional memory for musical excerpts in young and older adults

PubMed Central

Alonso, Irene; Dellacherie, Delphine; Samson, Séverine

2015-01-01

The emotions evoked by music can enhance recognition of excerpts. It has been suggested that memory is better for high than for low arousing music (Eschrich et al., 2005; Samson et al., 2009), but it remains unclear whether positively (Eschrich et al., 2008) or negatively valenced music (Aubé et al., 2013; Vieillard and Gilet, 2013) may be better recognized. Moreover, we still know very little about the influence of age on emotional memory for music. To address these issues, we tested emotional memory for music in young and older adults using musical excerpts varying in terms of arousal and valence. Participants completed immediate and 24 h delayed recognition tests. We predicted highly arousing excerpts to be better recognized by both groups in immediate recognition. We hypothesized that arousal may compensate consolidation deficits in aging, thus showing more prominent benefit of high over low arousing stimuli in older than younger adults on delayed recognition. We also hypothesized worst retention of negative excerpts for the older group, resulting in a recognition benefit for positive over negative excerpts specific to older adults. Our results suggest that although older adults had worse recognition than young adults overall, effects of emotion on memory do not seem to be modified by aging. Results on immediate recognition suggest that recognition of low arousing excerpts can be affected by valence, with better memory for positive relative to negative low arousing music. However, 24 h delayed recognition results demonstrate effects of emotion on memory consolidation regardless of age, with a recognition benefit for high arousal and for negatively valenced music. The present study highlights the role of emotion on memory consolidation. Findings are examined in light of the literature on emotional memory for music and for other stimuli. We finally discuss the implication of the present results for potential music interventions in aging and dementia. PMID

Incorporating Social Support in the Treatment of Anorexia Nervosa: Special Considerations for Older Adolescents and Young Adults

PubMed Central

Pisetsky, Emily M.; Utzinger, Linsey M.; Peterson, Carol B.

2016-01-01

Currently, research support is strongest for family-based treatment (FBT) for the treatment of anorexia nervosa (AN) in adolescents. However, a strong evidence base for treatments for older adolescents and young adults with AN is lacking. Emphasizing social support in the treatment of AN may be beneficial for older adolescents and young adults with AN. This paper provides a brief review of the literature on FBT for adolescent AN and provides a case example of adolescent AN treated with FBT. We then discuss novel treatments that have incorporated social support for older adolescents and young adults with AN, such as modified FBT and couples-based interventions. We provide case studies of each of these novel treatment approaches as well. Additionally, this paper highlights and discusses developmental considerations and challenges in working with older adolescents and young adults with AN. PMID:27429544

Approximate Quantification in Young, Healthy Older Adults', and Alzheimer Patients

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Gandini, Delphine; Lemaire, Patrick; Michel, Bernard Francois

2009-01-01

Forty young adults, 40 healthy older adults, and 39 probable AD patients were asked to estimate small (e.g., 25) and large (e.g., 60) collections of dots in a choice condition and in two no-choice conditions. Participants could choose between benchmark and anchoring strategies on each collection of dots in the choice condition and were required to…

Age-Related Gene Expression Differences in Monocytes from Human Neonates, Young Adults, and Older Adults

PubMed Central

Tong, Ann-Jay; Kollmann, Tobias R.; Smale, Stephen T.

2015-01-01

A variety of age-related differences in the innate and adaptive immune systems have been proposed to contribute to the increased susceptibility to infection of human neonates and older adults. The emergence of RNA sequencing (RNA-seq) provides an opportunity to obtain an unbiased, comprehensive, and quantitative view of gene expression differences in defined cell types from different age groups. An examination of ex vivo human monocyte responses to lipopolysaccharide stimulation or Listeria monocytogenes infection by RNA-seq revealed extensive similarities between neonates, young adults, and older adults, with an unexpectedly small number of genes exhibiting statistically significant age-dependent differences. By examining the differentially induced genes in the context of transcription factor binding motifs and RNA-seq data sets from mutant mouse strains, a previously described deficiency in interferon response factor-3 activity could be implicated in most of the differences between newborns and young adults. Contrary to these observations, older adults exhibited elevated expression of inflammatory genes at baseline, yet the responses following stimulation correlated more closely with those observed in younger adults. Notably, major differences in the expression of constitutively expressed genes were not observed, suggesting that the age-related differences are driven by environmental influences rather than cell-autonomous differences in monocyte development. PMID:26147648

Tracking reading: dual task costs of oral reading for young versus older adults.

PubMed

Kemper, Susan; Bontempo, Daniel; Schmalzried, RaLynn; McKedy, Whitney; Tagliaferri, Bruno; Kieweg, Doug

2014-02-01

A digital pursuit rotor was used to monitor oral reading costs by time-locking tracking performance to the auditory wave form produced as young and older adults were reading out short paragraphs. Multilevel modeling was used to determine how paragraph-level predictors of length, grammatical complexity, and readability and person-level predictors such as speaker age or working memory capacity predicted reading and tracking performance. In addition, sentence-by-sentence variation in tracking performance was examined during the production of individual sentences and during the pauses before upcoming sentences. The results suggest that dual tasking has a greater impact on older adults' reading comprehension and tracking performance. At the level of individual sentences, young and older adults adopt different strategies to deal with grammatically complex and propositionally dense sentences.

Differential effects of a visuospatial attention task on measures of postural control in young and older adults.

PubMed

Peterson, Jeffrey J; Keenan, Kevin G

2018-02-01

The purpose of this study was to examine the influence of a visuospatial attention task on three measures of postural control in young and older adults. 20 young (19-36  years) and 20 older (67-91 years) adults performed a choice stepping response time (CSRT) task, a submaximal dorsiflexion force steadiness task, and quiet standing in 3 bilateral stances. All tasks were performed with and without a visuospatial (VS) attention task that involved visualizing a star moving within a 2 × 2 grid. CSRT increased with the addition of the VS task in both groups (p  < .001), with a larger increase for older adults than young adults (p < .001). Older adults were less steady while performing the dorsiflexion task with the VS task (p  < .001), while the VS task did not influence steadiness in young adults (p = .235). Performance during quiet standing was not influenced by the VS task in any stance (p  > .084). The findings suggest that visuospatial attention differentially affects postural control in young and older adults and the effect is task-specific. These findings suggest the need to include stepping and force control tasks to further determine what role visuospatial attention plays in postural control. Copyright © 2017. Published by Elsevier Ltd.

The impact of beliefs about face recognition ability on memory retrieval processes in young and older adults.

PubMed

Humphries, Joyce E; Flowe, Heather D; Hall, Louise C; Williams, Louise C; Ryder, Hannah L

2016-01-01

This study examined whether beliefs about face recognition ability differentially influence memory retrieval in older compared to young adults. Participants evaluated their ability to recognise faces and were also given information about their ability to perceive and recognise faces. The information was ostensibly based on an objective measure of their ability, but in actuality, participants had been randomly assigned the information they received (high ability, low ability or no information control). Following this information, face recognition accuracy for a set of previously studied faces was measured using a remember-know memory paradigm. Older adults rated their ability to recognise faces as poorer compared to young adults. Additionally, negative information about face recognition ability improved only older adults' ability to recognise a previously seen face. Older adults were also found to engage in more familiarity than item-specific processing than young adults, but information about their face recognition ability did not affect face processing style. The role that older adults' memory beliefs have in the meta-cognitive strategies they employ is discussed.

Sensorimotor-Conceptual Integration in Free Walking Enhances Divergent Thinking for Young and Older Adults

PubMed Central

Kuo, Chun-Yu; Yeh, Yei-Yu

2016-01-01

Prior research has shown that free walking can enhance creative thinking. Nevertheless, it remains unclear whether bidirectional body-mind links are essential for the positive effect of free walking on creative thinking. Moreover, it is unknown whether the positive effect can be generalized to older adults. In Experiment 1, we replicated previous findings with two additional groups of young participants. Participants in the rectangular-walking condition walked along a rectangular path while generating unusual uses for chopsticks. Participants in the free-walking group walked freely as they wished, and participants in the free-generation condition generated unconstrained free paths while the participants in the random-experienced condition walked those paths. Only the free-walking group showed better performance in fluency, flexibility, and originality. In Experiment 2, two groups of older adults were randomly assigned to the free-walking and rectangular-walking conditions. The free-walking group showed better performance than the rectangular-walking group. Moreover, older adults in the free-walking group outperformed young adults in the rectangular-walking group in originality and performed comparably in fluency and flexibility. Bidirectional links between proprioceptive-motor kinematics and metaphorical abstract concepts can enhance divergent thinking for both young and older adults. PMID:27790178

GABA and primary motor cortex inhibition in young and older adults: a multimodal reliability study.

PubMed

Mooney, Ronan A; Cirillo, John; Byblow, Winston D

2017-07-01

The effects of healthy aging on γ-aminobutyric acid (GABA) within primary motor cortex (M1) remain poorly understood. Studies have reported contrasting results, potentially due to limitations with the common assessment technique. The aim of the present study was to investigate the effect of healthy aging on M1 GABA concentration and neurotransmission using a multimodal approach. Fifteen young and sixteen older adults participated in this study. Magnetic resonance spectroscopy (MRS) was used to measure M1 GABA concentration. Single-pulse and threshold-tracking paired-pulse transcranial magnetic stimulation (TMS) protocols were used to examine cortical silent period duration, short- and long-interval intracortical inhibition (SICI and LICI), and late cortical disinhibition (LCD). The reliability of TMS measures was examined with intraclass correlation coefficient analyses. SICI at 1 ms was reduced in older adults (15.13 ± 2.59%) compared with young (25.66 ± 1.44%; P = 0.002). However, there was no age-related effect for cortical silent period duration, SICI at 3 ms, LICI, or LCD (all P > 0.66). The intersession reliability of threshold-tracking measures was good to excellent for both young (range 0.75-0.96) and older adults (range 0.88-0.93). Our findings indicate that extrasynaptic inhibition may be reduced with advancing age, whereas GABA concentration and synaptic inhibition are maintained. Furthermore, MRS and threshold-tracking TMS provide valid and reliable assessment of M1 GABA concentration and neurotransmission, respectively, in young and older adults. NEW & NOTEWORTHY γ-Aminobutyric acid (GABA) in primary motor cortex was assessed in young and older adults using magnetic resonance spectroscopy and threshold-tracking paired-pulse transcranial magnetic stimulation. Older adults exhibited reduced extrasynaptic inhibition (short-interval intracortical inhibition at 1 ms) compared with young, whereas GABA concentration and synaptic inhibition were

Mechanical energy transfers across lower limb segments during stair ascent and descent in young and healthy older adults.

PubMed

Novak, Alison C; Li, Qingguo; Yang, Shuozhi; Brouwer, Brenda

2011-07-01

Older adults present with altered movement patterns during stair negotiation although the extent to which modifications in pattern and speed influence mechanical efficiency is unknown. This study evaluated mechanical energy transfers attributed to active force production during stair negotiation in young and older adults to provide insight into age-related changes in mechanical efficiency. Secondary analysis on data obtained from 23 young (23.7±3.0 years) and 32 older adults (67.0±8.2 years) during self-paced stair ascent and descent was conducted. Mechanical energy expenditures (MEE) during concentric transfer, eccentric transfer and no-transfer phases were determined for the ankle, knee and hip power profiles in the sagittal plane. Mechanical energy compensations (MEC) were also determined at each joint. During ascent, MEEs were similar for young and older adults although older adults compensated ankle muscles to a lesser extent during concentric muscle action. Controlling for cadence eliminated this difference. During descent, older adults demonstrated lower energy expenditures at the ankle and hip and similar expenditures at the knee compared to young adults. Changes in joint MEE in the older group resulted in reduced energy compensation at the ankle during concentric and eccentric activity and at the knee during eccentric activity. These age-related differences in mechanical energy transfers and related adjustments in MEC were not a function of the slower cadence in older adults and suggest a loss in mechanical efficiency. These results provide a benchmark against which physical impairments in older adults may be explored. Copyright © 2011 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.

Domain independence and stability in young and older adults' discounting of delayed rewards

PubMed Central

Jimura, Koji; Myerson, Joel; Hilgard, Joseph; Keighley, Julia; Braver, Todd S.; Green, Leonard

2011-01-01

Individual discounting rates for different types of delayed reward are typically assumed to reflect a single, underlying trait of impulsivity. Recently, we showed that discounting rates are orders of magnitude steeper for directly consumable liquid rewards than for monetary rewards (Jimura et al. 2009), raising the question of whether discounting rates for different types of reward covary at the individual level. Accordingly, the present study examined the relation between discounting of hypothetical money and real liquid rewards in young adults (Experiment 1) and older adults (Experiment 2). At the group level, young adults discounted monetary rewards more steeply than the older adults, but the reverse pattern was observed with liquid rewards. At the individual level, the rates at which young and older participants discounted each reward type were stable over a two- to fifteen-week interval (rs >.70), but there was no significant correlation between the rates at which they discounted the two reward types. These results suggest that although similar decision-making processes may underlie the discounting of different types of rewards, the rates at which individuals discount money and directly consumable rewards may reflect separate, stable traits, rather than a single trait of impulsivity. PMID:21550384

Young and older adults' beliefs about effective ways to mitigate age-related memory decline.

PubMed

Horhota, Michelle; Lineweaver, Tara; Ositelu, Monique; Summers, Kristi; Hertzog, Christopher

2012-06-01

This study investigated whether young and older adults vary in their beliefs about the impact of various mitigating factors on age-related memory decline. Eighty young (ages 18-23) and 80 older (ages 60-82) participants reported their beliefs about their own memory abilities and the strategies that they use in their everyday lives to attempt to control their memory. Participants also reported their beliefs about memory change with age for hypothetical target individuals who were described as using (or not using) various means to mitigate memory decline. There were no age differences in personal beliefs about control over current or future memory ability. However, the two age groups differed in the types of strategies they used in their everyday life to control their memory. Young adults were more likely to use internal memory strategies, whereas older adults were more likely to focus on cognitive exercise and maintaining physical health as ways to optimize their memory ability. There were no age differences in rated memory change across the life span in hypothetical individuals. Both young and older adults perceived strategies related to improving physical and cognitive health as effective means of mitigating memory loss with age, whereas internal memory strategies were perceived as less effective means for controlling age-related memory decline. PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2012 APA, all rights reserved

The Effects of Spatial Enclosure on Social Interaction Between Older Adults With Dementia and Young Children.

PubMed

Cerruti, Minyoung S; Shepley, Mardelle M

2016-04-01

To examine the impact of spatial enclosures on social interaction between older adults with early stage dementia and young children. Intergenerational interaction through meaningful activities can promote positive affects and behaviors of children and older adults. The development of social interaction is closely related to the physical environment in association with personal competence of older adults with dementia and young children. However, minimal attention has been given to the role of physical environment in influencing intergenerational interaction. A quasi-experiment examined the functional relationship between the amount of spatial enclosure and the types of social behaviors of older adults with dementia and young children. Semi-structured interviews, aided by a photographic simulation, were developed to explore the participants' perceptions of and experiences with the different degrees of spatial enclosure. Findings showed that the semienclosed spatial plan impacted both prosocial and antisocial behaviors of older adults with dementia in their interactions with young children. This apparent discrepancy was associated with two conflicting perceptions: a sense of openness and the lack of control due to distraction created by the loose visual boundary. There was no correlation between the elder-child neutral behaviors and the degrees of spatial enclosure. This study suggests that spaces with moderate openness without visual and acoustic distraction are the most desirable to promote prosocial behaviors of older adults with dementia and young children. Additionally, elder-child prosocial behaviors were likely facilitated by specific design features such as adequate personal space, the perception of openness, and possible spaces that provide both prospect and refuge in relation to spatial enclosure. © The Author(s) 2016.

Cross-modal enhancement of speech detection in young and older adults: does signal content matter?

PubMed

Tye-Murray, Nancy; Spehar, Brent; Myerson, Joel; Sommers, Mitchell S; Hale, Sandra

2011-01-01

The purpose of the present study was to examine the effects of age and visual content on cross-modal enhancement of auditory speech detection. Visual content consisted of three clearly distinct types of visual information: an unaltered video clip of a talker's face, a low-contrast version of the same clip, and a mouth-like Lissajous figure. It was hypothesized that both young and older adults would exhibit reduced enhancement as visual content diverged from the original clip of the talker's face, but that the decrease would be greater for older participants. Nineteen young adults and 19 older adults were asked to detect a single spoken syllable (/ba/) in speech-shaped noise, and the level of the signal was adaptively varied to establish the signal-to-noise ratio (SNR) at threshold. There was an auditory-only baseline condition and three audiovisual conditions in which the syllable was accompanied by one of the three visual signals (the unaltered clip of the talker's face, the low-contrast version of that clip, or the Lissajous figure). For each audiovisual condition, the SNR at threshold was compared with the SNR at threshold for the auditory-only condition to measure the amount of cross-modal enhancement. Young adults exhibited significant cross-modal enhancement with all three types of visual stimuli, with the greatest amount of enhancement observed for the unaltered clip of the talker's face. Older adults, in contrast, exhibited significant cross-modal enhancement only with the unaltered face. Results of this study suggest that visual signal content affects cross-modal enhancement of speech detection in both young and older adults. They also support a hypothesized age-related deficit in processing low-contrast visual speech stimuli, even in older adults with normal contrast sensitivity.

The emotional impact of national music on young and older adults differing in posttraumatic stress disorder symptoms.

PubMed

Bensimon, Moshe; Bodner, Ehud; Shrira, Amit

2017-10-01

In spite of previous evidence regarding the function of national songs as a contextual stimulus, their effect on the emotional state of older adults living with different levels of posttraumatic stress disorder (PTSD) symptoms has not be been examined. Following the 2014 Israel-Gaza conflict, we examined the emotional effects of listening to happy national songs (songs of Independence Day) and sad national songs (Memorial Day songs) on young (N = 144, mean age = 29.4) and older adults (N = 132, mean age = 68.5). Respondents were exposed to happy or sad national songs, and completed measures of exposure to missile attacks, related PTSD symptoms, and positive and negative emotions. Sad national songs were related to higher negative affect among young adults who were lower on PTSD symptoms, but not among their older counterparts. In contrast, sad national songs were related to higher negative affect among older adults who were higher on PTSD symptoms, but not among their young counterparts. These findings support the strength and vulnerability model, as they demonstrate that relative to young adults, older adults are generally more capable to withstand negative stimuli, yet are more sensitive to negative stimuli when they suffer from chronic vulnerability, as in the case of higher level of PTSD symptoms.

Differential involvement of knowledge representation and executive control in episodic memory performance in young and older adults.

PubMed

Bouazzaoui, Badiâa; Fay, Séverine; Taconnat, Laurence; Angel, Lucie; Vanneste, Sandrine; Isingrini, Michel

2013-06-01

Craik and Bialystok (2006, 2008) postulated that examining the evolution of knowledge representation and control processes across the life span could help in understanding age-related cognitive changes. The present study explored the hypothesis that knowledge representation and control processes are differentially involved in the episodic memory performance of young and older adults. Young and older adults were administered a cued-recall task and tests of crystallized knowledge and executive functioning to measure representation and control processes, respectively. Results replicate the classic finding that executive and cued-recall performance decline with age, but crystallized-knowledge performance does not. Factor analysis confirmed the independence of representation and control. Correlation analyses showed that the memory performance of younger adults was correlated with representation but not with control measures, whereas the memory performance of older adults was correlated with both representation and control measures. Regression analyses indicated that the control factor was the main predictor of episodic-memory performance for older adults, with the representation factor adding an independent contribution, but the representation factor was the sole predictor for young adults. This finding supports the view that factors sustaining episodic memory vary from young adulthood to old age; representation was shown to be important throughout adulthood, and control was also important for older adults. The results also indicated that control and representation modulate age-group-related variance in episodic memory.

Spatial navigation in young versus older adults

PubMed Central

Gazova, Ivana; Laczó, Jan; Rubinova, Eva; Mokrisova, Ivana; Hyncicova, Eva; Andel, Ross; Vyhnalek, Martin; Sheardova, Katerina; Coulson, Elizabeth J.; Hort, Jakub

2013-01-01

Older age is associated with changes in the brain, including the medial temporal lobe, which may result in mild spatial navigation deficits, especially in allocentric navigation. The aim of the study was to characterize the profile of real-space allocentric (world-centered, hippocampus-dependent) and egocentric (body-centered, parietal lobe dependent) navigation and learning in young vs. older adults, and to assess a possible influence of gender. We recruited healthy participants without cognitive deficits on standard neuropsychological testing, white matter lesions or pronounced hippocampal atrophy: 24 young participants (18–26 years old) and 44 older participants stratified as participants 60–70 years old (n = 24) and participants 71–84 years old (n = 20). All underwent spatial navigation testing in the real-space human analog of the Morris Water Maze, which has the advantage of assessing separately allocentric and egocentric navigation and learning. Of the eight consecutive trials, trials 2–8 were used to reduce bias by a rebound effect (more dramatic changes in performance between trials 1 and 2 relative to subsequent trials). The participants who were 71–84 years old (p < 0.001), but not those 60–70 years old, showed deficits in allocentric navigation compared to the young participants. There were no differences in egocentric navigation. All three groups showed spatial learning effect (p’ s ≤ 0.01). There were no gender differences in spatial navigation and learning. Linear regression limited to older participants showed linear (β = 0.30, p = 0.045) and quadratic (β = 0.30, p = 0.046) effect of age on allocentric navigation. There was no effect of age on egocentric navigation. These results demonstrate that navigation deficits in older age may be limited to allocentric navigation, whereas egocentric navigation and learning may remain preserved. This specific pattern of spatial navigation impairment may help differentiate normal aging from

Hypermnesia: a further examination of age differences between young and older adults.

PubMed

Otani, Hajime; Kato, Koichi; Von Glahn, Nicholas R; Nelson, Meghann E; Widner, Robert L; Goernert, Phillip N

2008-05-01

Previous studies that examined age differences in hypermnesia reported inconsistent results. The present experiment investigated whether the different study materials in these studies were responsible for the inconsistency. In particular, the present experiment examined whether the use of a video, as opposed to words and pictures, would eliminate previously reported age differences in hypermnesia. Fifteen college students and 15 older adults viewed a 3-minute video clip followed by two free-recall tests. The results indicated that older adults, as a whole, did not show hypermnesia. However, when older adults were divided into low and high memory groups based on test 1 performance, the high memory group showed hypermnesia whereas the low memory group did not show hypermnesia. The older adults in the low memory group were significantly older than the older adults in the high memory group - indicating that hypermnesia is inversely related to age in older adults. Reminiscence did not show an age-related difference in either the low or high memory group whereas inter-test forgetting did show an age difference in the low memory group. As expected, older adults showed greater inter-test forgetting than young adults in the low memory group. Findings from the present experiment suggest that video produces a pattern of results that is similar to the patterns obtained when words and pictures are used as study material. Thus, it appears that the nature of study material is not the source of inconsistency across the previous studies.

Effects of acute dietary nitrate supplementation on aortic blood pressure and aortic augmentation index in young and older adults.

PubMed

Hughes, William E; Ueda, Kenichi; Treichler, David P; Casey, Darren P

2016-09-30

Aging is associated with elevated blood pressure (peripheral and aortic; BP) and aortic augmentation index (AIx) which may contribute to aortic BP. Although inorganic nitrate consumption reduces peripheral BP in both young and older adults, the effects of nitrate consumption on aortic BP and wave reflection in young and older adults is unknown. Therefore, we sought to characterize the effects of nitrate consumption on aortic BP and AIx in young and older adults. Noninvasive aortic pressure waveforms were synthesized from high-fidelity radial pressure waveforms via applanation tonometry before and following (60, 90, 120, 150, and 180 min) consumption of a nitrate-rich beetroot juice in 26 healthy adults (young: 25 ± 4 years, n = 14; older: 64 ± 5 years, n = 12). Aortic BP and indices of aortic wave reflection (AIx and AIx normalized for heart rate; AIx@75bpm) were calculated from the generated aortic pressure waveform. Nitrate consumption increased plasma nitrite in both groups 60-180 min following beetroot consumption (P < 0.001). Nitrate consumption reduced peripheral and aortic BP in both young and older adults (P < 0.05), with the change being similar between age groups. Conversely, indices of aortic wave reflection were reduced only in young adults following nitrate consumption (range of change from baseline over time: AIx@75bpm, -4.3 to -8.8%, P < 0.05), whereas aortic AIx remained unchanged in the older adults. Taken together, our results suggest that acute dietary nitrate supplementation reduces peripheral and aortic BP similarly in young and older adults despite differential effects on aortic AIx between age groups. Copyright © 2016 Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.

Visual integration enhances associative memory equally for young and older adults without reducing hippocampal encoding activation.

PubMed

Memel, Molly; Ryan, Lee

2017-06-01

The ability to remember associations between previously unrelated pieces of information is often impaired in older adults (Naveh-Benjamin, 2000). Unitization, the process of creating a perceptually or semantically integrated representation that includes both items in an associative pair, attenuates age-related associative deficits (Bastin et al., 2013; Ahmad et al., 2015; Zheng et al., 2015). Compared to non-unitized pairs, unitized pairs may rely less on hippocampally-mediated binding associated with recollection, and more on familiarity-based processes mediated by perirhinal cortex (PRC) and parahippocampal cortex (PHC). While unitization of verbal materials improves associative memory in older adults, less is known about the impact of visual integration. The present study determined whether visual integration improves associative memory in older adults by minimizing the need for hippocampal (HC) recruitment and shifting encoding to non-hippocampal medial temporal structures, such as the PRC and PHC. Young and older adults were presented with a series of objects paired with naturalistic scenes while undergoing fMRI scanning, and were later given an associative memory test. Visual integration was varied by presenting the object either next to the scene (Separated condition) or visually integrated within the scene (Combined condition). Visual integration improved associative memory among young and older adults to a similar degree by increasing the hit rate for intact pairs, but without increasing false alarms for recombined pairs, suggesting enhanced recollection rather than increased reliance on familiarity. Also contrary to expectations, visual integration resulted in increased hippocampal activation in both age groups, along with increases in PRC and PHC activation. Activation in all three MTL regions predicted discrimination performance during the Separated condition in young adults, while only a marginal relationship between PRC activation and performance was

Domain independence and stability in young and older adults' discounting of delayed rewards.

PubMed

Jimura, Koji; Myerson, Joel; Hilgard, Joseph; Keighley, Julia; Braver, Todd S; Green, Leonard

2011-07-01

Individual discounting rates for different types of delayed reward are typically assumed to reflect a single, underlying trait of impulsivity. Recently, we showed that discounting rates are orders of magnitude steeper for directly consumable liquid rewards than for monetary rewards (Jimura et al., 2009), raising the question of whether discounting rates for different types of reward covary at the individual level. Accordingly, the present study examined the relation between discounting of hypothetical money and real liquid rewards in young adults (Experiment 1) and older adults (Experiment 2). At the group level, young adults discounted monetary rewards more steeply than the older adults, but there was no significant age difference with respect to liquid rewards. At the individual level, the rates at which young and older participants discounted each reward type were stable over a two- to fifteen-week interval (rs>70), but there was no significant correlation between the rates at which they discounted the two reward types. These results suggest that although similar decision-making processes may underlie the discounting of different types of rewards, the rates at which individuals discount money and directly consumable rewards may reflect separate, stable traits, rather than a single trait of impulsivity. Copyright © 2011 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.

Varicella-Zoster Virus-Specific Cellular Immune Responses to the Live Attenuated Zoster Vaccine in Young and Older Adults.

PubMed

Weinberg, Adriana; Canniff, Jennifer; Rouphael, Nadine; Mehta, Aneesh; Mulligan, Mark; Whitaker, Jennifer A; Levin, Myron J

2017-07-15

The incidence and severity of herpes zoster (HZ) increases with age. The live attenuated zoster vaccine generates immune responses similar to HZ. We compared the immune responses to zoster vaccine in young and older to adults to increase our understanding of the immune characteristics that may contribute to the increased susceptibility to HZ in older adults. Young (25-40 y; n = 25) and older (60-80 y; n = 33) adults had similar magnitude memory responses to varicella-zoster virus (VZV) ex vivo restimulation measured by responder cell-frequency and flow cytometry, but the responses were delayed in older compared with young adults. Only young adults had an increase in dual-function VZV-specific CD4 + and CD8 + T cell effectors defined by coexpression of IFN-γ, IL-2, and CD107a after vaccination. In contrast, older adults showed marginal increases in VZV-specific CD8 + CD57 + senescent T cells after vaccination, which were already higher than those of young adults before vaccination. An increase in VZV-stimulated CD4 + CD69 + CD57 + PD1 + and CD8 + CD69 + CD57 + PD1 + T cells from baseline to postvaccination was associated with concurrent decreased VZV-memory and CD8 + effector responses, respectively, in older adults. Blocking the PD1 pathway during ex vivo VZV restimulation increased the CD4 + and CD8 + proliferation, but not the effector cytokine production, which modestly increased with TIM-3 blockade. We conclude that high proportions of senescent and exhausted VZV-specific T cells in the older adults contribute to their poor effector responses to a VZV challenge. This may underlie their inability to contain VZV reactivation and prevent the development of HZ. Copyright © 2017 by The American Association of Immunologists, Inc.

When the mind wanders: age-related differences between young and older adults.

PubMed

Zavagnin, Michela; Borella, Erika; De Beni, Rossana

2014-01-01

Interest in mind wandering (MW) has grown in recent years, but few studies have assessed this phenomenon in older adults. The aim of this study was to assess age-related differences between young, young-old and old-old adults in MW using two versions of the sustained attention to response task (SART), one perceptual and one semantic. Different indicators were examined (i.e., reported MW episodes and behavioral indices of MW such as response time latency and variability, incorrect response and omission errors). The relationship between MW, certain basic mechanisms of cognition (working memory, inhibition and processing speed), cognitive failures and intrusive thoughts in everyday life was also explored. Findings in both versions of the SART indicated that older adults reported a lower frequency of MW episodes than young adults, but some of the behavioral indices of MW (response time variability, incorrect response and omission errors) were higher in old-old adults. This seems to suggest that MW becomes less frequent with aging, but more pervasive and detrimental to performance. Our results also indicated that the role of age and cognitive mechanisms in explaining MW depends on the demands of the SART task considered. Copyright © 2013 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.

Effects of word predictability and preview lexicality on eye movements during reading: A comparison between young and older adults.

PubMed

Choi, Wonil; Lowder, Matthew W; Ferreira, Fernanda; Swaab, Tamara Y; Henderson, John M

2017-05-01

Previous eye-tracking research has characterized older adults' reading patterns as "risky," arguing that compared to young adults, older adults skip more words, have longer saccades, and are more likely to regress to previous portions of the text. In the present eye-tracking study, we reexamined the claim that older adults adopt a risky reading strategy, utilizing the boundary paradigm to manipulate parafoveal preview and contextual predictability of a target word. Results showed that older adults had longer fixation durations compared to young adults; however, there were no age differences in skipping rates, saccade length, or proportion of regressions. In addition, readers showed higher skipping rates of the target word if the preview string was a word than if it was a nonword, regardless of age. Finally, the effect of predictability in reading times on the target word was larger for older adults than for young adults. These results suggest that older adults' reading strategies are not as risky as was previously claimed. Instead, we propose that older adults can effectively combine top-down information from the sentence context with bottom-up information from the parafovea to optimize their reading strategies. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2017 APA, all rights reserved).

Different coordination and flexibility of the spine and pelvis during lateral bending between young and older adults.

PubMed

Sung, Paul S

2016-04-01

This study examined coordination of the spine and pelvis during lateral bending of the trunk in older adults. Thirty-four healthy subjects (17 young and 17 older adults) demonstrated lateral bending at a controlled speed while holding a bar at approximately 180 degrees of shoulder flexion. Kinematic data collection was completed on the thoracic spine, lumbar spine, and pelvis. The coupling angle was calculated to examine the thorax-lumbar, lumbar-pelvis, and thorax-pelvis coordination patterns. The older adults demonstrated a reduced range of motion (ROM) of the lumbar spine, while both groups revealed similar ROM in the thorax and in the pelvis. The coupling angle between the straightening and bending phases was different only for the older adults in the thorax-lumbar (23.4±8.0 vs. -1.6±4.4, p=0.004) and the lumbar-pelvis (65.4±7.2 vs. 86.1±7.8, p=0.001) coordination. However, there was no group difference in the thorax-pelvis coordination. These findings indicate that age-related changes in the lumbar region affect coordination patterns only during the bending phase. The older adults preserved a similar pattern of movement to the young adults during the straightening phase, but the coordination variability of the coupling angles was greater for the older adults than for the young adults. This movement pattern suggests that the older adults lacked consistent trunk control in an attempt to optimize lateral bending coordination. Copyright © 2016 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.

Age differences in psychosocial predictors of positive and negative affect: a longitudinal investigation of young, midlife, and older adults.

PubMed

Windsor, Tim D; Anstey, Kaarin J

2010-09-01

Research has consistently shown that despite aging-related losses, older adults have high levels of emotional well-being relative to those in young and midlife adults. We aimed to contribute to knowledge around the factors that predict emotional well-being over the life course by examining age group differences in associations of positive and negative social exchanges and mastery beliefs with positive and negative affect in a sample of 7,472 young, midlife, and older adults assessed on 2 measurement occasions, 4 years apart. Results from structural equation models indicated lower levels of negative affect with advancing age. Mastery was consistently related to higher well-being, with the strongest associations evident for young adults. Older adults reported the most frequent positive and least frequent negative social exchanges; however, associations of social relations with affect tended to be stronger among young and midlife adults relative to older adults. Results are discussed in the context of life course perspectives on goal orientations and self-regulatory processes. (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved.

Effects of Task Instruction on Autobiographical Memory Specificity in Young and Older Adults

PubMed Central

Ford, Jaclyn Hennessey; Rubin, David C.; Giovanello, Kelly S.

2013-01-01

Older adults tend to retrieve autobiographical information that is overly general (i.e. not restricted to a single event, termed the overgenerality effect) relative to young adults’ specific memories. A vast majority of studies that have reported overgenerality effects explicitly instruct participants to retrieve specific memories, thereby requiring participants to maintain task goals, inhibit inappropriate responses, and control their memory search. Since these processes are impaired in healthy aging, it is important to determine whether such task instructions influence the magnitude of the overgenerality effect in older adults. In the current study, participants retrieved autobiographical memories during presentation of musical clips. Task instructions were manipulated to separate age-related differences in the specificity of underlying memory representations from age-related differences in following task instructions. Whereas young adults modulated memory specificity based on task demands, older adults did not. These findings suggest that reported rates of overgenerality in older adults’ memories may include age-related differences in memory representation, as well as differences in task compliance. Such findings provide a better understanding of the underlying cognitive mechanisms involved in age-related changes in autobiographical memory and may also be valuable for future research examining effects of overgeneral memory on general well-being. PMID:23915176

Hyperthermia and cardiovascular strain during an extreme heat exposure in young versus older adults

PubMed Central

Kenny, Glen P.; Poirier, Martin P.; Metsios, George S.; Boulay, Pierre; Dervis, Sheila; Friesen, Brian J.; Malcolm, Janine; Sigal, Ronald J.; Seely, Andrew J. E.; Flouris, Andreas D.

2017-01-01

ABSTRACT We examined whether older individuals experience greater levels of hyperthermia and cardiovascular strain during an extreme heat exposure compared to young adults. During a 3-hour extreme heat exposure (44°C, 30% relative humidity), we compared body heat storage, core temperature (rectal, visceral) and cardiovascular (heart rate, cardiac output, mean arterial pressure, limb blood flow) responses of young adults (n = 30, 19–28 years) against those of older adults (n = 30, 55–73 years). Direct calorimetry measured whole-body evaporative and dry heat exchange. Body heat storage was calculated as the temporal summation of heat production (indirect calorimetry) and whole-body heat loss (direct calorimetry) over the exposure period. While both groups gained a similar amount of heat in the first hour, the older adults showed an attenuated increase in evaporative heat loss (p < 0.033) in the first 30-min. Thereafter, the older adults were unable to compensate for a greater rate of heat gain (11 ± 1 ; p < 0.05) with a corresponding increase in evaporative heat loss. Older adults stored more heat (358 ± 173 kJ) relative to their younger (202 ± 92 kJ; p < 0.001) counterparts at the end of the exposure leading to greater elevations in rectal (p = 0.043) and visceral (p = 0.05) temperatures, albeit not clinically significant (rise < 0.5°C). Older adults experienced a reduction in calf blood flow (p < 0.01) with heat stress, yet no differences in cardiac output, blood pressure or heart rate. We conclude, in healthy habitually active individuals, despite no clinically observable cardiovascular or temperature changes, older adults experience greater heat gain and decreased limb perfusion in response to 3-hour heat exposure. PMID:28349096

Environment learning using descriptions or navigation: The involvement of working memory in young and older adults.

PubMed

Meneghetti, Chiara; Borella, Erika; Carbone, Elena; Martinelli, Massimiliano; De Beni, Rossana

2016-05-01

This study examined age-related differences between young and older adults in the involvement of verbal and visuo-spatial components of working memory (WM) when paths are learned from verbal and visuo-spatial inputs. A sample of 60 young adults (20-30 years old) and 58 older adults (60-75 years old) learned two paths from the person's point of view, one displayed in the form of a video showing the path, the other presenting the path in a verbal description. During the learning phase, participants concurrently performed a verbal task (articulatory suppression, AS group), or a visuo-spatial task (spatial tapping, ST group), or no secondary task (control, C group). After learning each path, participants completed tasks that involved the following: (1) recalling the sequential order and the location of landmarks; and (2) judging spatial sentences as true or false (verification test). The results showed that young adults outperformed older adults in all recall tasks. In both age groups performance in all types of task was worse in the AS and ST groups than in the C group, irrespective of the type of input. Overall, these findings suggest that verbal and visuo-spatial components of WM underpin the processing of environmental information in both young and older adults. The results are discussed in terms of age-related differences and according to the spatial cognition framework. © 2015 The British Psychological Society.

Brain glucose and acetoacetate metabolism: a comparison of young and older adults.

PubMed

Nugent, Scott; Tremblay, Sebastien; Chen, Kewei W; Ayutyanont, Napatkamon; Roontiva, Auttawut; Castellano, Christian-Alexandre; Fortier, Melanie; Roy, Maggie; Courchesne-Loyer, Alexandre; Bocti, Christian; Lepage, Martin; Turcotte, Eric; Fulop, Tamas; Reiman, Eric M; Cunnane, Stephen C

2014-06-01

The extent to which the age-related decline in regional brain glucose uptake also applies to other important brain fuels is presently unknown. Ketones are the brain's major alternative fuel to glucose, so we developed a dual tracer positron emission tomography protocol to quantify and compare regional cerebral metabolic rates for glucose and the ketone, acetoacetate. Twenty healthy young adults (mean age, 26 years) and 24 healthy older adults (mean age, 74 years) were studied. In comparison with younger adults, older adults had 8 ± 6% (mean ± SD) lower cerebral metabolic rates for glucose in gray matter as a whole (p = 0.035), specifically in several frontal, temporal, and subcortical regions, as well as in the cingulate and insula (p ≤ 0.01, false discovery rate correction). The effect of age on cerebral metabolic rates for acetoacetate in gray matter did not reach significance (p = 0.11). Rate constants (min(-1)) of glucose (Kg) and acetoacetate (Ka) were significantly lower (-11 ± 6%; [p = 0.005], and -19 ± 5%; [p = 0.006], respectively) in older adults compared with younger adults. There were differential effects of age on Kg and Ka as seen by significant interaction effects in the caudate (p = 0.030) and post-central gyrus (p = 0.023). The acetoacetate index, which expresses the scaled residuals of the voxel-wise linear regression of glucose on ketone uptake, identifies regions taking up higher or lower amounts of acetoacetate relative to glucose. The acetoacetate index was higher in the caudate of young adults when compared with older adults (p ≤ 0.05 false discovery rate correction). This study provides new information about glucose and ketone metabolism in the human brain and a comparison of the extent to which their regional use changes during normal aging. Copyright © 2014 Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.

Face Age and Eye Gaze Influence Older Adults' Emotion Recognition.

PubMed

Campbell, Anna; Murray, Janice E; Atkinson, Lianne; Ruffman, Ted

2017-07-01

Eye gaze has been shown to influence emotion recognition. In addition, older adults (over 65 years) are not as influenced by gaze direction cues as young adults (18-30 years). Nevertheless, these differences might stem from the use of young to middle-aged faces in emotion recognition research because older adults have an attention bias toward old-age faces. Therefore, using older face stimuli might allow older adults to process gaze direction cues to influence emotion recognition. To investigate this idea, young and older adults completed an emotion recognition task with young and older face stimuli displaying direct and averted gaze, assessing labeling accuracy for angry, disgusted, fearful, happy, and sad faces. Direct gaze rather than averted gaze improved young adults' recognition of emotions in young and older faces, but for older adults this was true only for older faces. The current study highlights the impact of stimulus face age and gaze direction on emotion recognition in young and older adults. The use of young face stimuli with direct gaze in most research might contribute to age-related emotion recognition differences. © The Author 2015. Published by Oxford University Press on behalf of The Gerontological Society of America. All rights reserved. For permissions, please e-mail: journals.permissions@oup.com.

Handgrip force steadiness in young and older adults: a reproducibility study.

PubMed

Blomkvist, Andreas W; Eika, Fredrik; de Bruin, Eling D; Andersen, Stig; Jorgensen, Martin

2018-04-02

Force steadiness is a quantitative measure of the ability to control muscle tonus. It is an independent predictor of functional performance and has shown to correlate well with different degrees of motor impairment following stroke. Despite being clinically relevant, few studies have assessed the validity of measuring force steadiness. The aim of this study was to explore the reproducibility of handgrip force steadiness, and to assess age difference in steadiness. Intrarater reproducibility (the degree to which a rating gives consistent result on separate occasions) was investigated in a test-retest design with seven days between sessions. Ten young and thirty older adults were recruited and handgrip steadiness was tested at 5%, 10% and 25% of maximum voluntary contraction (MVC) using Nintendo Wii Balance Board (WBB). Coefficients of variation were calculated from the mean force produced (CVM) and the target force (CVT). Area between the force curve and the target force line (Area) was also calculated. For the older adults we explored reliability using intraclass correlation coefficient (ICC) and agreement using standard error of measurement (SEM), limits of agreement (LOA) and smallest real difference (SRD). A systematic improvement in handgrip steadiness was found between sessions for all measures (CVM, CVT, Area). CVM and CVT at 5% of MVC showed good to high reliability, while Area had poor reliability for all percentages of MVC. Averaged ICC for CVM, CVT and Area was 0.815, 0.806 and 0.464, respectively. Averaged ICC on 5%, 10%, and 25% of MVC was 0.751, 0.667 and 0.668, respectively. Measures of agreement showed similar trends with better results for CVM and CVT than for Area. Young adults had better handgrip steadiness than older adults across all measures. The CVM and CVT measures demonstrated good reproducibility at lower percentages of MVC using the WBB, and could become relevant measures in the clinical setting. The Area measure had poor reproducibility

Proactive effects of memory in young and older adults: the role of change recollection.

PubMed

Wahlheim, Christopher N

2014-08-01

Age-related deficits in episodic memory are sometimes attributed to older adults being more susceptible to proactive interference. These deficits have been explained by impaired abilities to inhibit competing information and to recollect target information. In the present article, I propose that a change recollection deficit also contributes to age differences in proactive interference. Change recollection occurs when individuals can remember how information changed across episodes, and this counteracts proactive interference by preserving the temporal order of information. Three experiments were conducted to determine whether older adults are less likely to counteract proactive interference by recollecting change. Paired-associate learning paradigms with two lists of word pairs included pairs that repeated across lists, pairs that only appeared in List 2 (control items), and pairs with cues that repeated and responses that changed across lists. Young and older adults' abilities to detect changed pairs in List 2 and to later recollect those changes at test were measured, along with cued recall of the List 2 responses and confidence in recall performance. Change recollection produced proactive facilitation in the recall of changed pairs, whereas the failure to recollect change resulted in proactive interference. Confidence judgments were sensitive to these effects. The critical finding was that older adults recollected change less than did young adults, and this partially explained older adults' greater susceptibility to proactive interference. These findings have theoretical implications, showing that a change recollection deficit contributes to age-related deficits in episodic memory.

Quantifying stair gait stability in young and older adults, with modifications to insole hardness.

PubMed

Antonio, Patrick J; Perry, Stephen D

2014-07-01

Stair gait falls are prevalent in older adults aged 65 years and older. Extrinsic variables such as changes to insole hardness are important factors that can compromise the balance control system and increase the incidence of falls, especially since age-related decline in the cutaneous sensation is common. Balance measurements such as the minimum center of mass/base of support (COM-BOS, termed 'stability margin') and COM-BOS medial/lateral range provide information about stability during stair gait. This study was conducted to investigate stair gait stability of young and older adults, with modifications to insole hardness. Twenty healthy adults (10 young adults, 10 older adults) were recruited (mean age = 23.1, SD 2.1; mean age = 73.2, SD 5.5) and instructed to descend a 4 step staircase, for a total of 40 trials. All participants wore similar canvas shoes of varying sizes, and corresponding insole hardnesses (barefoot, soft, medium, hard). Kinematic equipment utilized 12 infrared markers anteriorly placed on the individual to record COM motion and BOS location. The findings from the study demonstrated that older adults were less stable during stair descent. Consequently, insole conditions revealed that the barefoot condition may increase the likelihood of falls, as opposed to the other insole hardnesses (soft, medium and hard). These results suggest that older adults while barefoot are putting themselves at a great risk of falling during stair descent. Since age-related changes are inevitable and the preferred footwear of choice inside the home is bare feet, this is a crucial issue that should be addressed. Copyright © 2014 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.

The effect of Bikram yoga on endothelial function in young and middle-aged and older adults.

PubMed

Hunter, Stacy D; Dhindsa, Mandeep S; Cunningham, Emily; Tarumi, Takashi; Alkatan, Mohammed; Nualnim, Nantinee; Elmenshawy, Ahmed; Tanaka, Hirofumi

2017-01-01

The purpose of this investigation was to determine if Bikram yoga, a style of heated hatha yoga, would improve endothelial function in young and middle-aged and older, healthy adults. This trial was performed in 36 young (n = 17) and middle-aged and older adults (n = 19) who completed 3 weekly Bikram yoga classes for 8 weeks. Height, body weight and body composition were determined and endothelial function was measured noninvasively using brachial artery flow-mediated dilation (FMD) before and after the intervention. No changes in body weight, BMI or body fat percentage occurred as a result of the intervention in either group. Brachial artery FMD was significantly increased in middle-aged and older (P < 0.05) but not in young adults as a result of the intervention. The results demonstrate that a relatively short-term Bikram yoga practice might significantly improve vascular endothelial function in middle-aged and older adults. While apparently healthy individuals in this study experienced no adverse events, those with preexisting conditions should take caution and consult with a physician prior to engaging in this style of yoga. Copyright © 2016 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

Source memory for action in young and older adults: self vs. close or unknown others.

PubMed

Rosa, Nicole M; Gutchess, Angela H

2011-09-01

The present study examines source memory for actions (e.g., placing items in a suitcase). For both young and older adult participants, source memory for actions performed by the self was better than memory for actions performed by either a known (close) or unknown other. In addition, neither young nor older adults were more likely to confuse self with close others than with unknown others. Results suggest an advantage in source memory for actions performed by the self compared to others, possibly associated with sensorimotor cues that are relatively preserved in aging.

Effects of ankle joint position and submaximal muscle contraction intensity on soleus H-reflex modulation in young and older adults.

PubMed

Chen, Yung-Sheng; Zhou, Shi; Cartwright, Colleen

2014-04-01

This study investigated the effects of ankle joint position and submaximal contraction intensity on soleus (SOL) H-reflex modulation. Twenty young (25.1 ± 4.8 years) and 20 older adults (74.2 ± 5.1 years) performed plantar flexions during 10%, 30% and 50% maximal voluntary contractions (MVC) and at ankle positions of neutral (0°), plantar flexion (20°) and dorsiflexion (-20°) in a sitting position. The SOL H-reflex gain in older adults was relatively lower than that in young adults during 10%, 30% and 50% MVC. The SOL H-reflex gain was significantly affected by the intensity of plantar flexion in the respective ankle joint position in both age groups. The latency of H-reflex was prolonged in older adults and was ankle joint dependent in young adults. Young adults demonstrated a shorter duration of the H-reflex response than that of older adults. The results indicated that there were age-related changes in the SOL H-reflex during the ankle plantar flexors activities.

Age-Differences in Environment Route Learning: The Role of Input and Recall-Test Modalities in Young and Older Adults

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Meneghetti, Chiara; Borella, Erika; Gyselinck, Valerie; De Beni, Rossana

2012-01-01

The aim of this research was to examine age-related differences in young and older adults in route learning, using different types of learning and recall test modalities. A sample of young adults (20-30 years old) and older adults (60-70 years old) learned a city route by using either a map or a description; they then performed a verification…

Implementing reverse mentoring to address social isolation among older adults.

PubMed

Breck, Bethany M; Dennis, Cory B; Leedahl, Skye N

2018-07-01

Reverse mentoring is a means to address the social work Grand Challenge of social isolation. Among older adults, reverse mentoring can improve social connection by increasing the digital competence of older adults so they can use technology for social benefit, and by facilitating intergenerational connections with young adult mentors. In this paper, reverse mentoring is examined within an intergenerational program that serves older adults and utilizes the native technological knowledge and skills of young adults who mentor older adult participants. Qualitative data were collected through young adult mentor logs of each session, and through open-ended questions on the post-surveys collected from older adults and young adult mentors. Qualitative analysis revealed three themes related to social connection: (1) an increased sense of self-efficacy for older adults as they build confidence in technological use, and for young adults as they develop leadership skills through mentoring, (2) the breaking down of age-related stereotypes, and (3) intergenerational engagement and connection. The findings demonstrate that reverse mentoring can be used in various settings to decrease the social isolation of older adults by developing intergenerational connections and increasing older adult usage of technology.

Viewing Our Aged Selves: Age Progression Simulations Increase Young Adults' Aging Anxiety and Negative Stereotypes of Older Adults.

PubMed

Rittenour, Christine E; Cohen, Elizabeth L

2016-04-01

This experiment tests the effect of an old-age progression simulation on young adults' (N = 139) reported aging anxiety and perceptions about older adults as a social group. College students were randomly assigned to one of three conditions: self-aged simulation, stranger-aged simulation, or a control group. Compared with the control group, groups exposed to an age progression experienced more negative affect, and individuals in the self-aged condition reported greater aging anxiety. In accordance with stereotype activation theorizing, the self-age simulation group also perceived older adults as less competent and expressed more pity and less envy for older adults. Compared to the stranger-aged group, participants who observed their own age progression were also the more likely to deny the authenticity of their transformed image.These findings highlight potential negative social and psychological consequences of using age simulations to affect positive health outcomes, and they shed light on how virtual experiences can affect stereotyping of older adults. © The Author(s) 2016.

Self-estimation of physical ability in stepping over an obstacle is not mediated by visual height perception: a comparison between young and older adults.

PubMed

Sakurai, Ryota; Fujiwara, Yoshinori; Ishihara, Masami; Yasunaga, Masashi; Ogawa, Susumu; Suzuki, Hiroyuki; Imanaka, Kuniyasu

2017-07-01

Older adults tend to overestimate their step-over ability. However, it is unclear as to whether this is caused by inaccurate self-estimation of physical ability or inaccurate perception of height. We, therefore, measured both visual height perception ability and self-estimation of step-over ability among young and older adults. Forty-seven older and 16 young adults performed a height perception test (HPT) and a step-over test (SOT). Participants visually judged the height of vertical bars from distances of 7 and 1 m away in the HPT, then self-estimated and, subsequently, actually performed a step-over action in the SOT. The results showed no significant difference between young and older adults in visual height perception. In the SOT, young adults tended to underestimate their step-over ability, whereas older adults either overestimated their abilities or underestimated them to a lesser extent than did the young adults. Moreover, visual height perception was not correlated with the self-estimation of step-over ability in both young and older adults. These results suggest that the self-overestimation of step-over ability which appeared in some healthy older adults may not be caused by the nature of visual height perception, but by other factor(s), such as the likely age-related nature of self-estimation of physical ability, per se.

Urothelial cancer of bladder in young versus older adults: clinical and pathological characteristics and outcomes.

PubMed

Telli, Onur; Sarici, Hasmet; Ozgur, Berat Cem; Doluoglu, Omer Gokhan; Sunay, Mehmet Melih; Bozkurt, Selen; Eroglu, Muzaffer

2014-09-01

Bladder urothelial carcinoma is rare in young adults and occurs more commonly in older individuals. The aim of this study was to compare the clinical behavior, pathologic characteristics, and prognosis of urothelial carcinoma of urinary bladder in young versus older adults. A retrospective review of our records between 2007 and 2013 identified 56 patients (42 males and 14 females) with transitional cell carcinoma of the bladder who were less than 40 years old. Clinical and pathological parameters of patients who were less than 40 years of age were compared with those of a series of patients older than 40 years of age (the control group) during the same period. A survival analysis was performed using the Kaplan-Meier method and log-rank test, and Cox regression was performed to identify clinical parameters that affected the clinical outcomes. The mean age was 29.21 years (range, 5-40 years) for patients less than 40 years old and 61.66 years (range, 41-75) for those older than 40 years. The mean follow-up was 40.26 months (range, 12-65 months) for young patients and 42.57 months (range, 12-72 months) for the older patients. Young bladder cancer patients had smaller-sized tumors (less than 3 cm), less high-grade cancers, higher papillary urothelial neoplasms of low malignant potential, and low-grade tumors than patients older than 40 years. Multivariate logistic regression analysis predicted tumor recurrence in young patients with high-grade tumors [odds ratio (OR), 1.959; 95% confidence interval (CI), 1.235-2.965; p = 0.046] and tumors larger than 3 cm (OR, 1.772; 95% CI, 1.416-1.942; p = 0.032). The 5-year overall survival rate was 100% for young patients and 88.1% for older patients. No difference was observed in the recurrence-free (p = 0.321) and progression-free (p = 0.422) survival rates between the two groups. We concluded that although the clinical stage distribution, natural history, and outcomes of bladder urothelial cancer in young adults are

Storage of Poisonous Substances and Firearms in Homes with Young Children Visitors and Older Adults

PubMed Central

Coyne-Beasley, Tamera; Runyan, Carol W.; Baccaglini, Lorena; Perkis, David; Johnson, Renee M.

2011-01-01

Background Most unintentional childhood poisonings and firearm injuries occur in residential environments. Therefore, a preventive strategy includes limiting children’s access to poisons and firearms through safe storage. This study examines storage of poisons and firearms among households with older adults, and households where young children reside compared to those where they visit only. Methods Sample is from a 2002 national random-digit-dial survey of 1003 households. Analyses were weighted to reflect the national population. Results There were 637 households with children residents or visitors aged <6 years. Seventy-five percent of the households (n =480) had children aged <6 as visitors only, and 15% had older adult residents (aged ≥70 years). Poisons and firearms were stored less securely in homes with young children as visitors as compared to those homes with resident young children. In 55% of homes where young children lived, and 74% of homes where young children were only visitors, household chemicals were reportedly stored unlocked. Although firearm ownership was comparable between the two categories of households (33% vs 34%), homes in which children were only visitors were more likely to store firearms unlocked (56%), than homes in which children resided (33%). Homes with older adult residents had more firearms present. Conclusions Children are at risk from improperly stored poisonous substances and firearms in their own homes and homes they visit. Strategies are needed to improve the storage practices of both poisons and firearms to minimize in-home hazards to young children, particularly raising awareness of these hazards to young visitors. PMID:15626565

When does meaning making predict subjective well-being? Examining young and older adults in two cultures.

PubMed

Alea, Nicole; Bluck, Susan

2013-01-01

Two studies in different cultures (Study 1: USA, N=174, Study 2: Trinidad, N=167) examined whether meaning making, (i.e., both searching for meaning, and directing behaviour) is positively related to subjective well-being (SWB) by age (younger, older adults). In both studies, participants self-reported engagement in meaning making, and SWB (e.g., affect, future time perspective, psychological well-being). In Study 1, young Americans (compared to older) more frequently used their past to direct behaviour but doing so was unrelated to SWB. In older Americans, both types of meaning making were positively associated with SWB. In Study 2, Trinidadian younger adults were again more likely than older adults to engage in meaning making. Unlike in the American sample, however, directing behaviour was positively related to SWB for both young and older adults. The studies demonstrate that whether meaning making shows benefits for SWB may depend on type of meaning, age and culture. Note that although meaning making was sometimes unrelated to SWB, no detrimental relations to meaning making were found. The discussion focuses on the role of moderators in understanding when meaning making should lead to benefits versus costs to SWB.

Voluntary sway and rapid orthogonal transitions of voluntary sway in young adults, and low and high fall-risk older adults.

PubMed

Tucker, Murray G; Kavanagh, Justin J; Morrison, Steven; Barrett, Rod S

2009-10-01

Falls amongst older people have been linked to reduced postural stability and slowed movement responses. The objective of this study was to examine differences in postural stability and the speed of response between young adults, low fall-risk older adults, and high fall-risk older adults during voluntary postural sway movements. Twenty-five young adults (25+/-4 years), and 32 low fall-risk (74+/-5 years), and 16 high fall-risk (79+/-7 years) older adults performed voluntary sway and rapid orthogonal transitions of voluntary sway between the anterior-posterior and medial-lateral directions. Measures included reaction and movement time and the amplitudes of the centre of pressure, centre of mass, and the separation distance between the centre of pressure and centre of mass. Both fall-risk groups compared to the young had slower reaction and movement time, greater centre of pressure and/or centre of mass amplitude in the orthogonal (non-target) direction during voluntary sway, and reduced anterior-posterior and medial-lateral separation between the centre of pressure and centre of mass during voluntary sway and orthogonal transitions. High compared to low fall-risk individuals had slower reaction and movement time, increased non-target centre of mass amplitude during voluntary sway, and reduced medial-lateral centre of pressure and centre of mass separation during voluntary sway and orthogonal transitions. Age-related deterioration of postural control resulted in slower reactive responses and reduced control of the direction of body movement during voluntary sway and orthogonal transitions. Slower postural reaction and movement time and reduced medial-lateral control of the centre of mass during voluntary sway movements are associated with increased fall-risk in community-living older people.

Selective attention affects conceptual object priming and recognition: a study with young and older adults.

PubMed

Ballesteros, Soledad; Mayas, Julia

2014-01-01

In the present study, we investigated the effects of selective attention at encoding on conceptual object priming (Experiment 1) and old-new recognition memory (Experiment 2) tasks in young and older adults. The procedures of both experiments included encoding and memory test phases separated by a short delay. At encoding, the picture outlines of two familiar objects, one in blue and the other in green, were presented to the left and to the right of fixation. In Experiment 1, participants were instructed to attend to the picture outline of a certain color and to classify the object as natural or artificial. After a short delay, participants performed a natural/artificial speeded conceptual classification task with repeated attended, repeated unattended, and new pictures. In Experiment 2, participants at encoding memorized the attended pictures and classify them as natural or artificial. After the encoding phase, they performed an old-new recognition memory task. Consistent with previous findings with perceptual priming tasks, we found that conceptual object priming, like explicit memory, required attention at encoding. Significant priming was obtained in both age groups, but only for those pictures that were attended at encoding. Although older adults were slower than young adults, both groups showed facilitation for attended pictures. In line with previous studies, young adults had better recognition memory than older adults.

Selective attention affects conceptual object priming and recognition: a study with young and older adults

PubMed Central

Ballesteros, Soledad; Mayas, Julia

2015-01-01

In the present study, we investigated the effects of selective attention at encoding on conceptual object priming (Experiment 1) and old–new recognition memory (Experiment 2) tasks in young and older adults. The procedures of both experiments included encoding and memory test phases separated by a short delay. At encoding, the picture outlines of two familiar objects, one in blue and the other in green, were presented to the left and to the right of fixation. In Experiment 1, participants were instructed to attend to the picture outline of a certain color and to classify the object as natural or artificial. After a short delay, participants performed a natural/artificial speeded conceptual classification task with repeated attended, repeated unattended, and new pictures. In Experiment 2, participants at encoding memorized the attended pictures and classify them as natural or artificial. After the encoding phase, they performed an old–new recognition memory task. Consistent with previous findings with perceptual priming tasks, we found that conceptual object priming, like explicit memory, required attention at encoding. Significant priming was obtained in both age groups, but only for those pictures that were attended at encoding. Although older adults were slower than young adults, both groups showed facilitation for attended pictures. In line with previous studies, young adults had better recognition memory than older adults. PMID:25628588

Young children's attitudes and perceptions of older adults.

PubMed

Burke, J L

Children ages four to seven judged relative ages of unfamiliar adults from photographs and chose photographs of adults in response to sociometric items. Age discrimination was highly accurate by age six. Children identified older adults as sad, lonely and not busy, but older adults were bypassed on items like "knows a lot" and preferences for teachers. In interviews, most of the children accurately identified older people by relying on physiognomic cues. Most described their grandparents as examples of known older people and expressed positive views of the activities they share. Images of passivity, and of older people engaged in domestic, but not "outside" work were also present. Children's attitudes were found to parallel those held by older adults in recent polls; older children in the sample were more likely to hold stereotypical images. Two-thirds of the children preferred not to grow old. Contact of children with older adults other than their grandparents was limited, especially in work settings or schools. It was concluded that deliberate programming in preschools and elementary schools is important to offset early ageist attitude formation.

Proactive effects of memory in young and older adults: The role of change recollection

PubMed Central

Wahlheim, Christopher N.

2015-01-01

Age-related deficits in episodic memory are sometimes attributed to older adults being more susceptible to proactive interference. These deficits have been explained by impaired abilities to inhibit competing information and to recollect target information. In the present article, I propose that a change recollection deficit also contributes to age differences in proactive interference. Change recollection occurs when individuals can remember how information changed across episodes, and this counteracts proactive interference by preserving the temporal order of information. Three experiments were conducted to determine whether older adults are less likely to counteract proactive interference by recollecting change. Paired-associate learning paradigms with two lists of word pairs included pairs that repeated across lists, pairs that only appeared in List 2 (control items), and pairs with cues that repeated and responses that changed across lists. Young and older adults’ abilities to detect changed pairs in List 2 and to later recollect those changes at test were measured, along with cued recall of the List 2 responses and confidence in recall performance. Change recollection produced proactive facilitation in the recall of changed pairs, whereas the failure to recollect change resulted in proactive interference. Confidence judgments were sensitive to these effects. The critical finding was that older adults recollected change less than did young adults, and this partially explained older adults’ greater susceptibility to proactive interference. These findings have theoretical implications, showing that a change recollection deficit contributes to age-related deficits in episodic memory. PMID:24710672

Effects of Transcranial Direct Current Stimulation on Neural Networks in Young and Older Adults

PubMed

Martin, Andrew K; Meinzer, Marcus; Lindenberg, Robert; Sieg, Mira M; Nachtigall, Laura; Flöel, Agnes

2017-11-01

Transcranial direct current stimulation (tDCS) may be a viable tool to improve motor and cognitive function in advanced age. However, although a number of studies have demonstrated improved cognitive performance in older adults, other studies have failed to show restorative effects. The neural effects of beneficial stimulation response in both age groups is lacking. In the current study, tDCS was administered during simultaneous fMRI in 42 healthy young and older participants. Semantic word generation and motor speech baseline tasks were used to investigate behavioral and neural effects of uni- and bihemispheric motor cortex tDCS in a three-way, crossover, sham tDCS controlled design. Independent components analysis assessed differences in task-related activity between the two age groups and tDCS effects at the network level. We also explored whether laterality of language network organization was effected by tDCS. Behaviorally, both active tDCS conditions significantly improved semantic word retrieval performance in young and older adults and were comparable between groups and stimulation conditions. Network-level tDCS effects were identified in the ventral and dorsal anterior cingulate networks in the combined sample during semantic fluency and motor speech tasks. In addition, a shift toward enhanced left laterality was identified in the older adults for both active stimulation conditions. Thus, tDCS results in common network-level modulations and behavioral improvements for both age groups, with an additional effect of increasing left laterality in older adults.

Priming of familiar and unfamiliar visual objects over delays in young and older adults.

PubMed

Soldan, Anja; Hilton, H John; Cooper, Lynn A; Stern, Yaakov

2009-03-01

Although priming of familiar stimuli is usually age invariant, little is known about how aging affects priming of preexperimentally unfamiliar stimuli. Therefore, this study investigated the effects of aging and encoding-to-test delays (0 min, 20 min, 90 min, and 1 week) on priming of unfamiliar objects in block-based priming paradigms. During the encoding phase, participants viewed pictures of novel objects (Experiments 1 and 2) or novel and familiar objects (Experiment 3) and judged their left-right orientation. In the test block, priming was measured using the possible-impossible object-decision test (Experiment 1), symmetric-asymmetric object-decision test (Experiment 2), and real-nonreal object-decision test (Experiment 3). In Experiments 1 and 2, young adults showed priming for unfamiliar objects at all delays, whereas older adults whose baseline task performance was similar to that of young adults did not show any priming. Experiment 3 found no effects of age or delay on priming of familiar objects; however, priming of unfamiliar objects was only observed in the young participants. This suggests that when older adults cannot rely on preexisting memory representations, age-related deficits in priming can emerge.

Effects of induced sad mood on facial emotion perception in young and older adults.

PubMed

Lawrie, Louisa; Jackson, Margaret C; Phillips, Louise H

2018-02-15

Older adults perceive less intense negative emotion in facial expressions compared to younger counterparts. Prior research has also demonstrated that mood alters facial emotion perception. Nevertheless, there is little evidence which evaluates the interactive effects of age and mood on emotion perception. This study investigated the effects of sad mood on younger and older adults' perception of emotional and neutral faces. Participants rated the intensity of stimuli while listening to sad music and in silence. Measures of mood were administered. Younger and older participants' rated sad faces as displaying stronger sadness when they experienced sad mood. While younger participants showed no influence of sad mood on happiness ratings of happy faces, older adults rated happy faces as conveying less happiness when they experienced sad mood. This study demonstrates how emotion perception can change when a controlled mood induction procedure is applied to alter mood in young and older participants.

Strategy Repetition in Young and Older Adults: A Study in Arithmetic

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Lemaire, Patrick; Leclère, Mariel

2014-01-01

We investigated a new phenomenon that sheds light on age-related differences in strategy selection: the strategy repetition phenomenon (i.e., tendency to repeat the same strategy over consecutive items). Young and older adults had to provide the best estimates of multiplication problems like 47 × 86. They had to select the best of 2 rounding…

The relationship between executive function and fine motor control in young and older adults.

PubMed

Corti, Emily J; Johnson, Andrew R; Riddle, Hayley; Gasson, Natalie; Kane, Robert; Loftus, Andrea M

2017-01-01

The present study examined the relationship between executive function (EF) and fine motor control in young and older healthy adults. Participants completed 3 measures of executive function; a spatial working memory (SWM) task, the Stockings of Cambridge task (planning), and the Intra-Dimensional Extra-Dimensional Set-Shift task (set-shifting). Fine motor control was assessed using 3 subtests of the Purdue Pegboard (unimanual, bimanual, sequencing). For the younger adults, there were no significant correlations between measures of EF and fine motor control. For the older adults, all EFs significantly correlated with all measures of fine motor control. Three separate regressions examined whether planning, SWM and set-shifting independently predicted unimanual, bimanual, and sequencing scores for the older adults. Planning was the primary predictor of performance on all three Purdue subtests. A multiple-groups mediation model examined whether planning predicted fine motor control scores independent of participants' age, suggesting that preservation of planning ability may support fine motor control in older adults. Planning remained a significant predictor of unimanual performance in the older age group, but not bimanual or sequencing performance. The findings are discussed in terms of compensation theory, whereby planning is a key compensatory resource for fine motor control in older adults. Copyright © 2016 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.

Age-Related Locomotion Characteristics in Association with Balance Function in Young, Middle-Aged, and Older Adults.

PubMed

Lee, Hwang-Jae; Chang, Won Hyuk; Hwang, Sun Hee; Choi, Byung-Ok; Ryu, Gyu-Ha; Kim, Yun-Hee

2017-04-01

The purpose of this study was to examine age-related gait characteristics and their associations with balance function in older adults. A total of 51 adult volunteers participated. All subjects underwent locomotion analysis using a 3D motion analysis and 12-channel dynamic electromyography system. Dynamic balance function was assessed by the Berg Balance Scale. Older adults showed a higher level of muscle activation than young adults, and there were significant positive correlations between increased age and activation of the trunk and thigh muscles in the stance and swing phase of the gait cycle. In particular, back extensor muscle activity was mostly correlated with the dynamic balance in older adults. Thus, back extensor muscle activity in walking may provide a clue for higher falling risk in older adults. This study demonstrates that the back extensor muscles play very important roles with potential for rehabilitation training to improve balance and gait in older adults.

Aging in movement representations for sequential finger movements: a comparison between young-, middle-aged, and older adults.

PubMed

Caçola, Priscila; Roberson, Jerroed; Gabbard, Carl

2013-06-01

Studies show that as we enter older adulthood (>64years), our ability to mentally represent action in the form of using motor imagery declines. Using a chronometry paradigm to compare the movement duration of imagined and executed movements, we tested young-, middle-aged, and older adults on their ability to perform sequential finger (fine-motor) movements. The task required number recognition and ordering and was presented in three levels of complexity. Results for movement duration indicated no differences between young- and middle-aged adults, however both performed faster than the older group. In regard to the association between imagined and executed actions, correlation analyses indicated that values for all groups were positive and moderate (r's .80,.76,.70). In summary, whereas the older adults were significantly slower in processing actions than their younger counterparts, the ability to mentally represent their actions was similar. Copyright © 2013 Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.

Sociality and intergenerational transfer of older adults' nostalgia.

PubMed

Wildschut, Tim; Sedikides, Constantine; Robertson, Sara

2018-05-03

Interest in nostalgia has blossomed, yet its nature in older adulthood and potential for intergenerational transfer to younger adults has remained neglected. In Experiment 1, we focused on the content of older adults' nostalgic (vs. ordinary) recollections and asked whether older adults' nostalgia could be transferred to younger adults. We showed that nostalgia expressed in older adults' narratives was positively associated with nostalgia reported by young-adult readers. In Experiment 2, undergraduates read a nostalgic or ordinary narrative written by an older adult. Then they rated their own nostalgia as well as their perceived social connectedness, self-continuity, and meaning in life. Exposure to older adults' nostalgic (vs. ordinary) narratives promoted concurrent nostalgia among young adults, along with associated psychological benefits (social connectedness, self-continuity, meaning). The findings illustrate the potential for intergenerational transfer of nostalgia through written narratives, and attest to the universality of nostalgic themes across younger and older adults.

Older adults learn less, but still reduce metabolic cost, during motor adaptation

PubMed Central

Huang, Helen J.

2013-01-01

The ability to learn new movements and dynamics is important for maintaining independence with advancing age. Age-related sensorimotor changes and increased muscle coactivation likely alter the trial-and-error-based process of adapting to new movement demands (motor adaptation). Here, we asked, to what extent is motor adaptation to novel dynamics maintained in older adults (≥65 yr)? We hypothesized that older adults would adapt to the novel dynamics less well than young adults. Because older adults often use muscle coactivation, we expected older adults to use greater muscle coactivation during motor adaptation than young adults. Nevertheless, we predicted that older adults would reduce muscle activity and metabolic cost with motor adaptation, similar to young adults. Seated older (n = 11, 73.8 ± 5.6 yr) and young (n = 15, 23.8 ± 4.7 yr) adults made targeted reaching movements while grasping a robotic arm. We measured their metabolic rate continuously via expired gas analysis. A force field was used to add novel dynamics. Older adults had greater movement deviations and compensated for just 65% of the novel dynamics compared with 84% in young adults. As expected, older adults used greater muscle coactivation than young adults. Last, older adults reduced muscle activity with motor adaptation and had consistent reductions in metabolic cost later during motor adaptation, similar to young adults. These results suggest that despite increased muscle coactivation, older adults can adapt to the novel dynamics, albeit less accurately. These results also suggest that reductions in metabolic cost may be a fundamental feature of motor adaptation. PMID:24133222

Influence of divergent and convergent thinking on visuomotor adaptation in young and older adults.

PubMed

Simon, Anja; Bock, Otmar

2016-04-01

Visuomotor adaptation declines in older age. This has been attributed to cognitive impairments. One relevant cognitive function could be creativity, since creativity is implicated as mediator of early learning. The present study therefore evaluates whether two aspects of creativity, divergent and convergent thinking, are differentially involved in the age-dependent decline of visuomotor adaptation. In 25 young and 24 older volunteers, divergent thinking was assessed by the alternative-uses-task (AUT), convergent thinking by the Intelligenz-Struktur-Test-2000 (IST), and sensorimotor-adaptation by a pointing task with 60° rotated visual feedback. Young participants outperformed older participants in all three tasks. AUT scores were positively associated with young but not older participants' adaptive performance, whereas IST scores were negatively associated with older but not young participants' adaptive performance. This pattern of findings could be attributed to a consistent relationship between AUT, IST and adaptation; taking this into account, adaptation deficits of older participants were no longer significant. We conclude that divergent thinking supports workaround-strategies during adaptation, but doesn't influence visuomotor recalibration. Furthermore, the decay of divergent thinking in older adults may explain most of age-related decline of adaptive strategies. When the age-related decay of divergent thinking coincides with well-preserved convergent thinking, adaptation suffers most. Copyright © 2015 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.

Eye-fixation patterns of high- and low-span young and older adults: down the garden path and back again.

PubMed

Kemper, Susan; Crow, Angela; Kemtes, Karen

2004-03-01

Young and older adults' eye fixations were monitored as they read sentences with temporary ambiguities such as "The experienced soldiers warned about the dangers conducted the midnight raid." Their fixation patterns were similar except that older adults made many regressions. In a 2nd experiment, high- and low-span older adults were compared with high- and low-span young adults. Pint-pass fixations were similar, except low-span readers made many regressions and their total fixation times were longer. High-span readers also used the focus operator "only" (e.g., "Only experienced soldiers warned about the dangers.") to immediately resolve the temporary ambiguities. No age group differences were observed. These results are discussed with reference to theories of the role of working memory in sentence processing.

Comparisons of magnitude estimation scaling of rock music by children, young adults, and older people.

PubMed

Fucci, D; Kabler, H; Webster, D; McColl, D

1999-12-01

The present study concerned the perceptual processing of complex auditory stimuli in 10 children (M age = 8.1) as compared to 10 young adults (M age = 19.3) and 10 older adult subjects (M age = 54.2). The auditory stimulus used was 10 sec. of rock music (Led Zeppelin, 1969). All three groups provided numerical responses to nine intensities of the rock music stimulus (10, 20, 30, 40, 50, 60, 70, 80, 90 dB above threshold). Analysis showed that the children reported a wider range of numerical responses than both adult groups. The mean numerical responses for the children ranged from .54 to 54.24. For the young adults the range was .76 to 11.37, and for the older subjects it was 1.6 to 23.31. Results suggest that the children were not bound by the same set of rules as the adults with regard to magnitude estimation scaling of the loudness of the rock music stimulus. Their internal scaling mechanisms appeared to be more flexible and broader based than those of the adults who participated in this study.

Forever young: Visual representations of gender and age in online dating sites for older adults.

PubMed

Gewirtz-Meydan, Ateret; Ayalon, Liat

2017-06-13

Online dating has become increasingly popular among older adults following broader social media adoption patterns. The current study examined the visual representations of people on 39 dating sites intended for the older population, with a particular focus on the visualization of the intersection between age and gender. All 39 dating sites for older adults were located through the Google search engine. Visual thematic analysis was performed with reference to general, non-age-related signs (e.g., facial expression, skin color), signs of aging (e.g., perceived age, wrinkles), relational features (e.g., proximity between individuals), and additional features such as number of people presented. The visual analysis in the present study revealed a clear intersection between ageism and sexism in the presentation of older adults. The majority of men and women were smiling and had a fair complexion, with light eye color and perceived age of younger than 60. Older women were presented as younger and wore more cosmetics as compared with older men. The present study stresses the social regulation of sexuality, as only heterosexual couples were presented. The narrow representation of older adults and the anti-aging messages portrayed in the pictures convey that love, intimacy, and sexual activity are for older adults who are "forever young."

Divergent creative thinking in young and older adults: Extending the effects of an episodic specificity induction.

PubMed

Madore, Kevin P; Jing, Helen G; Schacter, Daniel L

2016-08-01

Recent research has suggested that an episodic specificity induction-brief training in recollecting the details of a past experience-enhances divergent creative thinking on the alternate uses task (AUT) in young adults, without affecting performance on tasks thought to involve little divergent thinking; however, the generalizability of these results to other populations and tasks is unknown. In the present experiments, we examined whether the effects of an episodic specificity induction would extend to older adults and a different index of divergent thinking, the consequences task. In Experiment 1, the specificity induction significantly enhanced divergent thinking on the AUT in both young and older adults, as compared with a control induction not requiring specific episodic retrieval; performance on a task involving little divergent thinking (generating associates for common objects) did not vary as a function of induction. No overall age-related differences were observed on either task. In Experiment 2, the specificity induction significantly enhanced divergent thinking (in terms of generating consequences of novel scenarios) in young adults, relative to another control induction not requiring episodic retrieval. To examine the types of creative ideas affected by the induction, the participants in both experiments also labeled each of their divergent-thinking responses as an "old idea" from memory or a "new idea" from imagination. New, and to some extent old, ideas were significantly boosted following the specificity induction relative to the control. These experiments provide novel evidence that an episodic specificity induction can boost divergent thinking in young and older adults, and indicate that episodic memory is involved in multiple divergent-thinking tasks.

Divergent creative thinking in young and older adults: Extending the effects of an episodic specificity induction

PubMed Central

Madore, Kevin P.; Jing, Helen G.; Schacter, Daniel L.

2016-01-01

Recent research has suggested that an episodic specificity induction- brief training in recollecting the details of a past experience- enhances divergent creative thinking on the Alternate Uses Task (AUT) in young adults without affecting performance on tasks thought to involve little divergent thinking, but the generalizability of these results to other populations and tasks is unknown. The present experiments examined whether effects of an episodic specificity induction extend to older adults and a different index of divergent thinking, the Consequences Task. In Experiment 1, the specificity induction significantly enhanced divergent thinking on the AUT in both young and older adults compared with a control induction not requiring specific episodic retrieval; performance on a task involving little divergent thinking did not vary as a function of induction (generating associates for common objects). No overall age-related differences were observed on either task. In Experiment 2, the specificity induction significantly enhanced divergent thinking (generating consequences of novel scenarios) in young adults compared with another control induction not requiring episodic retrieval. To examine the types of creative ideas affected by the induction, participants in both experiments also labeled each of their divergent thinking responses as an old idea from memory or new idea from imagination. New and to some extent old ideas were significantly boosted following the specificity induction compared with the control. These experiments provide novel evidence that an episodic specificity induction can boost divergent thinking in young and older adults, and indicate that episodic memory is involved in multiple divergent thinking tasks. PMID:27001170

Inefficient postural responses to unexpected slips during walking in older adults.

PubMed

Tang, P F; Woollacott, M H

1998-11-01

Slips account for a high percentage of falls and subsequent injuries in community-dwelling older adults but not in young adults. This phenomenon suggests that although active and healthy older adults preserve a mobility level comparable to that of young adults, these older adults may have difficulty generating efficient reactive postural responses when they slip. This study tested the hypothesis that active and healthy older adults use a less effective reactive balance strategy than young adults when experiencing an unexpected forward slip occurring at heel strike during walking. This less effective balance strategy would be manifested by slower and smaller postural responses, altered temporal and spatial organization of the postural responses, and greater upper trunk instability after the slip. Thirty-three young adults (age range=19-34 yrs, mean=25+/-4 yrs) and 32 community-dwelling older adults (age range=70-87 yrs, mean=74+/-14 yrs) participated. Subjects walked across a movable forceplate which simulated a forward slip at heel strike. Surface electromyography was recorded from bilateral leg, thigh, hip, and trunk muscles. Kinematic data were collected from the right (perturbed) side of the body. Although the predominant postural muscles and the activation sequence of these muscles were similar between the two age groups, the postural responses of older adults were of longer onset latencies, smaller magnitudes, and longer burst durations compared to young adults. Older adults also showed a longer coactivation duration for the ankle, knee, and trunk agonist/antagonist pairs on the perturbed side and for the knee agonist/antagonist pair on the nonperturbed side. Behaviorally, older adults became less stable after the slips. This was manifested by a higher incidence of being tripped (21 trials in older vs 5 trials in young adults) and a greater trunk hyperextension with respect to young adults. Large arm elevation was frequently used by older adults to assist in

Walkway Length Determination for Steady State Walking in Young and Older Adults

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Macfarlane, Pamela A.; Looney, Marilyn A.

2008-01-01

The primary purpose of this study was to determine acceleration (AC) and deceleration (DC) distances that would accommodate young and older adults walking at their preferred and fast speeds. A secondary purpose was to determine the minimal walkway length needed to record six steady state (SS) steps (three full gait cycles) for younger and older…

Effect of omega-3 polyunsaturated fatty acid supplementation on central arterial stiffness and arterial wave reflections in young and older healthy adults

PubMed Central

Monahan, Kevin D; Feehan, Robert P; Blaha, Cheryl; McLaughlin, Daniel J

2015-01-01

Increased central arterial stiffness and enhanced arterial wave reflections may contribute to increased risk of cardiovascular disease development with advancing age. Omega-3 polyunsaturated fatty acid (n-3) ingestion may reduce cardiovascular risk via favorable effects exerted on arterial structure and function. We determined the effects of n-3 supplementation (4 g/day for 12 weeks) on important measures of central arterial stiffness (carotid-femoral pulse wave velocity; PWV) and arterial wave reflection (central augmentation index) in young (n = 12; 25 ± 1-year-old, mean ± SE) and older (n = 12; 66 ± 2) healthy adults. We hypothesized that n-3 supplementation would decrease carotid-femoral PWV and central augmentation index in older adults. Our results indicate that carotid-femoral PWV and central augmentation index were greater in older (988 ± 65 cm/sec and 33 ± 2%) than in young adults (656 ± 16 cm/sec and 3 ± 4%: both P < 0.05 compared to older) before the intervention (Pre). N-3 supplementation decreased carotid-femoral PWV in older (Δ-9 ± 2% Precompared to Post; P < 0.05), but not young adults (Δ2 ± 3%). Central augmentation index was unchanged by n-3 supplementation in young (3 ± 4 vs. 0 ± 4% for Pre and Post, respectively) and older adults (33 ± 2 vs. 35 ± 3%). Arterial blood pressure at rest, although increased with age, was not altered by n-3 supplementation in young or older adults. Collectively, these data indicate that 12 weeks of daily n-3 supplementation decreases an important measure of central arterial stiffness (carotid-femoral PWV) in older, but not young healthy adults. The mechanism underlying decreased central arterial stiffness with n-3 supplementation is unknown, but appears to be independent of effects on arterial blood pressure or arterial wave reflections. PMID:26109192

Changes in blood glucose and salivary cortisol are not necessary for arousal to enhance memory in young or older adults.

PubMed

Gore, Jane B; Krebs, Desiree L; Parent, Marise B

2006-06-01

Emotional arousal enhances memory, and this memory-enhancing effect may involve neurochemicals released by arousal, such as glucose and cortisol. Physiological consequences of arousal change with age, and these changes may contribute to age-related memory decline. The present study examined whether emotionally arousing pictures would affect glucose and cortisol levels and enhance memory in young and older adults. Blood glucose and salivary cortisol were measured once before and six times after young and old adults viewed either 60 highly arousing or 60 relatively neutral pictures. Recall for the stimuli was measured 75 min later. The results indicated that recall was impaired in older adults. Arousal as measured by self-report enhanced recall in both young and older adults. However, arousal did not affect glucose or cortisol levels in either group. These findings demonstrate that changes in blood glucose or salivary cortisol levels are not necessary for arousal to enhance memory.

Dynamic stability control in forward falls: postural corrections after muscle fatigue in young and older adults.

PubMed

Mademli, Lida; Arampatzis, Adamantios; Karamanidis, Kiros

2008-06-01

Many studies report that muscle strength loss may alter the human system's capacity to generate rapid force for balance corrections after perturbations, leading to deficient recovery behaviours. Yet little is known regarding the effect of modifications in the neuromuscular system induced by fatigue on dynamic stability control during postural perturbations. This study investigates the effect of muscle strength decline induced by fatiguing contractions on the dynamic stability control of young and older adults during forward falls. Eleven young and eleven older male adults had to regain balance after sudden falls before and after submaximal fatiguing knee extension-flexion contractions. Young subjects had a higher margin of stability than older ones before and after the fatiguing task. This reflects their enhanced ability in using mechanisms for maintaining dynamic stability (i.e. a greater base of support). The margin of stability, the boundary of the base of support and the position of the extrapolated centre of mass, remained unaffected by the reduction in muscle strength induced by the fatiguing contractions, indicating an appropriate adjustment of the motor commands to compensate the deficit in muscle strength. Both young and older adults were able to counteract the decreased horizontal ground reaction forces after the fatiguing task by flexing their knee to a greater extent, leading to similar decreases in the horizontal velocity of centre of mass as in the pre fatigue condition. The results demonstrate the ability of the central nervous system to rapidly modify the execution of postural corrections including mechanisms for maintaining dynamic stability.

Temporal characteristics of imagined and actual walking in frail older adults.

PubMed

Nakano, Hideki; Murata, Shin; Shiraiwa, Kayoko; Iwase, Hiroaki; Kodama, Takayuki

2018-05-09

Mental chronometry, commonly used to evaluate motor imagery ability, measures the imagined time required for movements. Previous studies investigating mental chronometry of walking have investigated healthy older adults. However, mental chronometry in frail older adults has not yet been clarified. To investigate temporal characteristics of imagined and actual walking in frail older adults. We investigated the time required for imagined and actual walking along three walkways of different widths [width(s): 50, 25, 15 cm × length: 5 m] in 29 frail older adults and 20 young adults. Imagined walking was measured with mental chronometry. We observed significantly longer imagined and actual walking times along walkways of 50, 25, and 15 cm width in frail older adults compared with young adults. Moreover, temporal differences (absolute error) between imagined and actual walking were significantly greater in frail older adults than in young adults along walkways with a width of 25 and 15 cm. Furthermore, we observed significant differences in temporal differences (constant error) between frail older adults and young adults for walkways with a width of 25 and 15 cm. Frail older adults tended to underestimate actual walking time in imagined walking trials. Our results suggest that walkways of different widths may be a useful tool to evaluate age-related changes in imagined and actual walking in frail older adults.

Medial prefrontal cortex supports source memory for self-referenced materials in young and older adults

PubMed Central

Leshikar, Eric D.; Duarte, Audrey

2013-01-01

Behavioral evidence suggests that young and older adults show a benefit in source memory accuracy when processing materials in reference to the self. In the young, activity within the medial prefrontal cortex supports this source memory benefit at study. This investigation examined whether the same neural regions support this memory benefit in both age groups. Using fMRI, participants were scanned while studying and retrieving pictures of objects paired with one of three scenes (source) under self-reference and other-reference conditions. At the time of study, half of the items were presented once and half twice, allowing us to match behavioral performance between groups. Both groups showed equivalent source accuracy benefit for objects encoded self-referentially. Activity in the left dorsal medial prefrontal cortex supported subsequent source memory in both age groups for the self-referenced relative to the other-referenced items. At the time of test, source accuracy for both self- and other-referenced items was supported by a network of regions including the precuneus in both age groups. At both study and test, little in the way of age-differences emerged, suggesting that when matched on behavioral performance young and older adults engage similar regions in support of source memory when processing materials in reference to the self; however, when performance was not matched, age differences in functional recruitment were prevalent. These results suggest that by capitalizing on preserved processes (self-referential encoding), older adults can show improvement in memory for source details which typically are not well remembered relative to the young. PMID:23904335

Word frequency influences on the list length effect and associative memory in young and older adults.

PubMed

Badham, Stephen P; Whitney, Cora; Sanghera, Sumeet; Maylor, Elizabeth A

2017-07-01

Many studies show that age deficits in memory are smaller for information supported by pre-experimental experience. Many studies also find dissociations in memory tasks between words that occur with high and low frequencies in language, but the literature is mixed regarding the extent of word frequency effects in normal ageing. We examined whether age deficits in episodic memory could be influenced by manipulations of word frequency. In Experiment 1, young and older adults studied short and long lists of high- and low-frequency words for free recall. The list length effect (the drop in proportion recalled for longer lists) was larger in young compared to older adults and for high- compared to low-frequency words. In Experiment 2, young and older adults completed item and associative recognition memory tests with high- and low-frequency words. Age deficits were greater for associative memory than for item memory, demonstrating an age-related associative deficit. High-frequency words led to better associative memory performance whilst low-frequency words resulted in better item memory performance. In neither experiment was there any evidence for age deficits to be smaller for high- relative to low-frequency words, suggesting that word frequency effects on memory operate independently from effects due to cognitive ageing.

Recognition of facial, auditory, and bodily emotions in older adults.

PubMed

Ruffman, Ted; Halberstadt, Jamin; Murray, Janice

2009-11-01

Understanding older adults' social functioning difficulties requires insight into their recognition of emotion processing in voices and bodies, not just faces, the focus of most prior research. We examined 60 young and 61 older adults' recognition of basic emotions in facial, vocal, and bodily expressions, and when matching faces and bodies to voices, using 120 emotion items. Older adults were worse than young adults in 17 of 30 comparisons, with consistent difficulties in recognizing both positive (happy) and negative (angry and sad) vocal and bodily expressions. Nearly three quarters of older adults functioned at a level similar to the lowest one fourth of young adults, suggesting that age-related changes are common. In addition, we found that older adults' difficulty in matching emotions was not explained by difficulty on the component sources (i.e., faces or voices on their own), suggesting an additional problem of integration.

Anticipatory Motor Planning in Older Adults.

PubMed

Wunsch, Kathrin; Weigelt, Matthias; Stöckel, Tino

2017-05-01

The end-state comfort (ESC) effect represents an efficiency constraint in anticipatory motor planning. Although young adults usually avoid uncomfortable postures at the end of goal-directed movements, newer studies revealed that children's sensitivity for ESC is not fully in place before the age of 10 years. In this matter, it is surprising that nothing is known about the development of the ESC effect at older ages. Therefore, the aim of the present study was to examine the development of anticipatory motor planning in older adults. In 2 experiments, a total of 119 older adults (from 60 to 80 years old) performed in an unimanual (Experiment 1) and a bimanual version (Experiment 2) of the bar-transport-task. Across both experiments, the propensity of the ESC effect was significantly lower in the old-old (71-80 years old) as compared with the young-old (60-70 years old) participants. Although the performance of the young-old participants in the unimanual and bimanual task was comparable to what has been reported for young adults, the performance of the old-old participants was rather similar to the behavior of children younger than 10 years. Thus, for the first time, evidence is provided for the decrease of the ESC effect in older adults. © The Author 2015. Published by Oxford University Press on behalf of The Gerontological Society of America. All rights reserved. For permissions, please e-mail: journals.permissions@oup.com.

Effect of omega-3 polyunsaturated fatty acid supplementation on central arterial stiffness and arterial wave reflections in young and older healthy adults.

PubMed

Monahan, Kevin D; Feehan, Robert P; Blaha, Cheryl; McLaughlin, Daniel J

2015-06-01

Increased central arterial stiffness and enhanced arterial wave reflections may contribute to increased risk of cardiovascular disease development with advancing age. Omega-3 polyunsaturated fatty acid (n-3) ingestion may reduce cardiovascular risk via favorable effects exerted on arterial structure and function. We determined the effects of n-3 supplementation (4 g/day for 12 weeks) on important measures of central arterial stiffness (carotid-femoral pulse wave velocity; PWV) and arterial wave reflection (central augmentation index) in young (n = 12; 25 ± 1-year-old, mean ± SE) and older (n = 12; 66 ± 2) healthy adults. We hypothesized that n-3 supplementation would decrease carotid-femoral PWV and central augmentation index in older adults. Our results indicate that carotid-femoral PWV and central augmentation index were greater in older (988 ± 65 cm/sec and 33 ± 2%) than in young adults (656 ± 16 cm/sec and 3 ± 4%: both P < 0.05 compared to older) before the intervention (Pre). N-3 supplementation decreased carotid-femoral PWV in older (∆-9 ± 2% Precompared to Post; P < 0.05), but not young adults (∆2 ± 3%). Central augmentation index was unchanged by n-3 supplementation in young (3 ± 4 vs. 0 ± 4% for Pre and Post, respectively) and older adults (33 ± 2 vs. 35 ± 3%). Arterial blood pressure at rest, although increased with age, was not altered by n-3 supplementation in young or older adults. Collectively, these data indicate that 12 weeks of daily n-3 supplementation decreases an important measure of central arterial stiffness (carotid-femoral PWV) in older, but not young healthy adults. The mechanism underlying decreased central arterial stiffness with n-3 supplementation is unknown, but appears to be independent of effects on arterial blood pressure or arterial wave reflections. © 2015 The Authors. Physiological Reports published by Wiley Periodicals, Inc. on behalf of the American Physiological Society

Tracking Reading: Dual Task Costs of Oral Reading for Young versus Older Adults

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Kemper, Susan; Bontempo, Daniel; Schmalzried, RaLynn; McKedy, Whitney; Tagliaferri, Bruno; Kieweg, Doug

2014-01-01

A digital pursuit rotor was used to monitor oral reading costs by time-locking tracking performance to the auditory wave form produced as young and older adults were reading out short paragraphs. Multilevel modeling was used to determine how paragraph-level predictors of length, grammatical complexity, and readability and person-level predictors…

Attitudinal and Normative Predictors of Alcohol Use by Older Adolescents and Young Adults.

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Kuther, Tara L.; Higgins-D'Alessandro, Ann

2003-01-01

Examines a model of alcohol use based on the theory of planned behavior, and expectancy theory on the influence of parents and peers with older adolescents and young adults. Results suggest that, during adolescence, decisions to consume alcohol are rational, based on the consideration of the positive consequences of alcohol use; however, the…

The Impact of Motivation and Task Difficulty on Resource Engagement: Differential Influences on Cardiovascular Responses of Young and Older Adults

PubMed Central

Smith, Brian T.; Hess, Thomas M.

2018-01-01

This study examined whether the level of cognitive engagement older adults were willing to invest is disproportionately influenced by the personal implications of the task, as suggested by Selective Engagement Theory. We experimentally altered the personal implications of the task by manipulating participants accountability for their performance. Young (N = 50) and older (N = 50) adults performed a memory-search task of moderate difficulty but within the capabilities of both age groups. Both physiological (systolic blood pressure responsivity; SBP-R) and subjective (NASA-TLX) measures of cognitive effort were assessed across all difficulty levels. The results replicated findings from previous research that indicated older adults must exert more effort than younger adults to achieve the same level of objective performance. Most importantly, our results showed that older adults were especially sensitive to our accountability manipulation, with the difference in SBP-R between accountability conditions being greater for older than for young adults. Finally, we found that there was little relation between subjective measures of workload and our physiological measures of task engagement. Together, the results of this study provide continued support for the Selective Engagement Theory. PMID:29670932

The Role of Forgetting Rate in Producing a Benefit of Expanded over Equal Spaced Retrieval in Young and Older Adults

PubMed Central

Maddox, Geoffrey B.; Balota, David A.; Coane, Jennifer H.; Duchek, Janet M.

2011-01-01

The current study examined the effects of two manipulations on equal and expanded spaced retrieval schedules in young and older adults. First, we examined the role that the type of expansion (systematic vs. nonsystematic) has in producing a benefit of expanded retrieval. Second, we examined the influence of an immediate retrieval attempt to minimize forgetting after the original encoding event. It was predicted that including multiple retrieval attempts with minimal intervening spacing (best accomplished in a nonsystematic retrieval schedule) would be necessary to produce a benefit of expanded retrieval over equal spaced retrieval for older adults but not young adults due to age differences in working memory capacity. Results from two experiments revealed that the presence of an expanded over equal spaced retrieval benefit is modulated by the extent to which the spacing conditions minimize forgetting in the early retrieval attempts in the spaced conditions. As predicted, these conditions differ substantially across young and older adults. In particular, in older adults two intervening items between early retrieval attempts produce dramatic rates of forgetting compared to one intervening item, whereas younger adults can maintain performance up to five intervening events in comparable conditions. Discussion focuses on age differences in short term forgetting, working memory capacity, and the relation between forgetting rates and spaced retrieval schedules. PMID:21463056

Corticospinal Plasticity in Bilateral Primary Motor Cortices Induced by Paired Associative Stimulation to the Dominant Hemisphere Does Not Differ between Young and Older Adults

PubMed Central

Dickins, Daina S. E.

2017-01-01

Older adults have been shown to exhibit a reduction in the lateralization of neural activity. Although neuroplasticity induced by noninvasive brain stimulation has been reported to be attenuated in the targeted motor cortex of older adults, it remains possible that the plasticity effects may instead manifest in a more distributed (bilateral) network. Furthermore, attention, which modulates neuroplasticity in young adults, may influence these effects. To address these questions, plasticity was induced in young (19–32 years) and older (65–78 years) adults using transcranial magnetic stimulation (TMS) paired with peripheral nerve stimulation. The plasticity effects induced by this paired associative stimulation (PAS) protocol in the targeted and nontargeted hemispheres were probed using TMS-induced motor-evoked potentials (MEPs) recorded from the abductor pollicis brevis (APB) muscle of each hand. PAS-induced effects were highly variable across individuals, with only half of the participants in each group demonstrating the expected increase in MEP amplitude. Contrary to predictions, however, PAS-induced corticospinal plasticity manifests predominately in the targeted hemisphere for both young and older adults. Attention to the target hand did not enhance corticospinal plasticity. The results suggest that plasticity does not manifest differently across bilateral corticospinal pathways between young and older adults. PMID:29147586

Effects of utterance length and vocal loudness on speech breathing in older adults.

PubMed

Huber, Jessica E

2008-12-31

Age-related reductions in pulmonary elastic recoil and respiratory muscle strength can affect how older adults generate subglottal pressure required for speech production. The present study examined age-related changes in speech breathing by manipulating utterance length and loudness during a connected speech task (monologue). Twenty-three older adults and twenty-eight young adults produced a monologue at comfortable loudness and pitch and with multi-talker babble noise playing in the room to elicit louder speech. Dependent variables included sound pressure level, speech rate, and lung volume initiation, termination, and excursion. Older adults produced shorter utterances than young adults overall. Age-related effects were larger for longer utterances. Older adults demonstrated very different lung volume adjustments for loud speech than young adults. These results suggest that older adults have a more difficult time when the speech system is being taxed by both utterance length and loudness. The data were consistent with the hypothesis that both young and older adults use utterance length in premotor speech planning processes.

Young Children's Attitudes and Perceptions of Older Adults.

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Burke, Judith Lee

1981-01-01

Studied the responses of children aged four to seven to photographs of older adults. Results indicated age discrimination was highly accurate by age six. Most expressed positive views of activities shared with grandparents but identified older adults in general as sad, lonely, and not busy. (Author/JAC)

Delayed plastic responses to anodal tDCS in older adults

PubMed Central

Fujiyama, Hakuei; Hyde, Jane; Hinder, Mark R.; Kim, Seok-Jin; McCormack, Graeme H.; Vickers, James C.; Summers, Jeffery J.

2014-01-01

Despite the abundance of research reporting the neurophysiological and behavioral effects of transcranial direct current stimulation (tDCS) in healthy young adults and clinical populations, the extent of potential neuroplastic changes induced by tDCS in healthy older adults is not well understood. The present study compared the extent and time course of anodal tDCS-induced plastic changes in primary motor cortex (M1) in young and older adults. Furthermore, as it has been suggested that neuroplasticity and associated learning depends on the brain-derived neurotrophic factor (BDNF) gene polymorphisms, we also assessed the impact of BDNF polymorphism on these effects. Corticospinal excitability was examined using transcranial magnetic stimulation before and following (0, 10, 20, 30 min) anodal tDCS (30 min, 1 mA) or sham in young and older adults. While the overall extent of increases in corticospinal excitability induced by anodal tDCS did not vary reliably between young and older adults, older adults exhibited a delayed response; the largest increase in corticospinal excitability occurred 30 min following stimulation for older adults, but immediately post-stimulation for the young group. BDNF genotype did not result in significant differences in the observed excitability increases for either age group. The present study suggests that tDCS-induced plastic changes are delayed as a result of healthy aging, but that the overall efficacy of the plasticity mechanism remains unaffected. PMID:24936185

Audio-Visual and Meaningful Semantic Context Enhancements in Older and Younger Adults.

PubMed

Smayda, Kirsten E; Van Engen, Kristin J; Maddox, W Todd; Chandrasekaran, Bharath

2016-01-01

Speech perception is critical to everyday life. Oftentimes noise can degrade a speech signal; however, because of the cues available to the listener, such as visual and semantic cues, noise rarely prevents conversations from continuing. The interaction of visual and semantic cues in aiding speech perception has been studied in young adults, but the extent to which these two cues interact for older adults has not been studied. To investigate the effect of visual and semantic cues on speech perception in older and younger adults, we recruited forty-five young adults (ages 18-35) and thirty-three older adults (ages 60-90) to participate in a speech perception task. Participants were presented with semantically meaningful and anomalous sentences in audio-only and audio-visual conditions. We hypothesized that young adults would outperform older adults across SNRs, modalities, and semantic contexts. In addition, we hypothesized that both young and older adults would receive a greater benefit from a semantically meaningful context in the audio-visual relative to audio-only modality. We predicted that young adults would receive greater visual benefit in semantically meaningful contexts relative to anomalous contexts. However, we predicted that older adults could receive a greater visual benefit in either semantically meaningful or anomalous contexts. Results suggested that in the most supportive context, that is, semantically meaningful sentences presented in the audiovisual modality, older adults performed similarly to young adults. In addition, both groups received the same amount of visual and meaningful benefit. Lastly, across groups, a semantically meaningful context provided more benefit in the audio-visual modality relative to the audio-only modality, and the presence of visual cues provided more benefit in semantically meaningful contexts relative to anomalous contexts. These results suggest that older adults can perceive speech as well as younger adults when both

Audio-Visual and Meaningful Semantic Context Enhancements in Older and Younger Adults

PubMed Central

Smayda, Kirsten E.; Van Engen, Kristin J.; Maddox, W. Todd; Chandrasekaran, Bharath

2016-01-01

Speech perception is critical to everyday life. Oftentimes noise can degrade a speech signal; however, because of the cues available to the listener, such as visual and semantic cues, noise rarely prevents conversations from continuing. The interaction of visual and semantic cues in aiding speech perception has been studied in young adults, but the extent to which these two cues interact for older adults has not been studied. To investigate the effect of visual and semantic cues on speech perception in older and younger adults, we recruited forty-five young adults (ages 18–35) and thirty-three older adults (ages 60–90) to participate in a speech perception task. Participants were presented with semantically meaningful and anomalous sentences in audio-only and audio-visual conditions. We hypothesized that young adults would outperform older adults across SNRs, modalities, and semantic contexts. In addition, we hypothesized that both young and older adults would receive a greater benefit from a semantically meaningful context in the audio-visual relative to audio-only modality. We predicted that young adults would receive greater visual benefit in semantically meaningful contexts relative to anomalous contexts. However, we predicted that older adults could receive a greater visual benefit in either semantically meaningful or anomalous contexts. Results suggested that in the most supportive context, that is, semantically meaningful sentences presented in the audiovisual modality, older adults performed similarly to young adults. In addition, both groups received the same amount of visual and meaningful benefit. Lastly, across groups, a semantically meaningful context provided more benefit in the audio-visual modality relative to the audio-only modality, and the presence of visual cues provided more benefit in semantically meaningful contexts relative to anomalous contexts. These results suggest that older adults can perceive speech as well as younger adults when

Outcomes of allogeneic hematopoietic cell transplantation for adolescent and young adults compared with children and older adults with acute myeloid leukemia.

PubMed

Majhail, Navneet S; Brazauskas, Ruta; Hassebroek, Anna; Bredeson, Christopher N; Hahn, Theresa; Hale, Gregory A; Horowitz, Mary M; Lazarus, Hillard M; Maziarz, Richard T; Wood, William A; Parsons, Susan K; Joffe, Steven; Rizzo, J Douglas; Lee, Stephanie J; Hayes-Lattin, Brandon M

2012-06-01

Adolescents and young adults (AYAs) with cancer have not experienced improvements in survival to the same extent as children and older adults. We compared outcomes among children (<15 years), AYAs (15-40 years) and older adults (>40 years) receiving allogeneic hematopoietic cell transplant (HCT) for acute myeloid leukemia (AML). Our cohort consisted of 900 children, 2,708 AYA, and 2,728 older adult recipients of HLA-identical sibling or unrelated donor (URD) transplantation using myeloablative or reduced-intensity/nonmyeloablative conditioning. Outcomes were assessed over three time periods (1980-1988, 1989-1997, 1998-2005) for siblings and two time periods (1989-1997, 1998-2005) for URD HCT. Analyses were stratified by donor type. Results showed overall survival for AYAs using either siblings or URD improved over time. Although children had better and older adults had worse survival compared with AYAs, improvements in survival for AYAs did not lag behind those for children and older adults. After sibling donor HCT, 5-year adjusted survival for the three time periods was 40%, 48%, and 53% for children, 35%, 41%, and 42% for AYAs, and 22%, 30%, and 34% for older adults. Among URD HCT recipients, 5-year adjusted survival for the two time periods was 38% and 37% for children, 24% and 28% for AYAs, and 19% and 23% for older adults. Improvements in survival occurred because of a reduction in risk of treatment-related mortality. The risk of relapse did not change over time. Improvements in survival among AYAs undergoing allogeneic HCT for AML have paralleled those among children and older adults. Copyright © 2012 American Society for Blood and Marrow Transplantation. Published by Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.

The effect of warnings on false memories in young and older adults.

PubMed

McCabe, David P; Smith, Anderson D

2002-10-01

In the present experiments, we examined adult age differences in the ability to suppress false memories, using the Deese-Roediger-McDermott (DRM) paradigm (Deese, 1959; Roediger & McDermott, 1995). Participants studied lists of words (e.g., bed, rest, awake, etc.), each related to a nonpresented critical lure word (e.g., sleep). Typically, recognition tests reveal false alarms to critical lures at rates comparable to those for hits for studied words. In two experiments, separate groups of young and older adults were unwarned about the false memory effect, warned before studying the lists, or warned after study and before test. Lists were presented at either a slow rate (4 sec/word) or a faster rate (2 sec/word). Young adults were better able to discriminate between studied words and critical lures when warned about the DRM effect either before study or after study but before retrieval, and their performance improved with a slower presentation rate. Older adults were able to discriminate between studied words and critical lures when given warnings before study, but not when given warnings after study but before retrieval. Performance on a working memory capacity measure predicted false recognition following study and retrieval warnings. The results suggest that effective use of warnings to reduce false memories is contingent on the quality and type of encoded information, as well as on whether that information is accessed at retrieval. Furthermore, discriminating between similar sources of activation is dependent on working memory capacity, which declines with advancing age.

Dual-process models of associative recognition in young and older adults: evidence from receiver operating characteristics.

PubMed

Healy, Michael R; Light, Leah L; Chung, Christie

2005-07-01

In 3 experiments, young and older adults studied lists of unrelated word pairs and were given confidence-rated item and associative recognition tests. Several different models of recognition were fit to the confidence-rating data using techniques described by S. Macho (2002, 2004). Concordant with previous findings, item recognition data were best fit by an unequal-variance signal detection theory model for both young and older adults. For both age groups, associative recognition performance was best explained by models incorporating both recollection and familiarity components. Examination of parameter estimates supported the conclusion that recollection is reduced in old age, but inferences about age differences in familiarity were highly model dependent. Implications for dual-process models of memory in old age are discussed. ((c) 2005 APA, all rights reserved).

Differences in the way older and younger adults rate threat in faces but not situations.

PubMed

Ruffman, Ted; Sullivan, Susan; Edge, Nigel

2006-07-01

We compared young and healthy older adults' ability to rate photos of faces and situations (e.g., sporting activities) for the degree of threat they posed. Older adults did not distinguish between more and less dangerous faces to the same extent as younger adults did. In contrast, we found no significant age differences in young and older adults' ability to distinguish between high- and low-danger situations. The differences between young and older adults on the face task were independent of age differences in older adults' fluid IQ. We discuss results in relation to differences between young and older adults on emotion-recognition tasks; we also discuss sociocognitive and neuropsychological (e.g., amygdala) theories of aging.

Movement trajectory smoothness is not associated with the endpoint accuracy of rapid multi-joint arm movements in young and older adults

PubMed Central

Poston, Brach; Van Gemmert, Arend W.A.; Sharma, Siddharth; Chakrabarti, Somesh; Zavaremi, Shahrzad H.; Stelmach, George

2013-01-01

The minimum variance theory proposes that motor commands are corrupted by signal-dependent noise and smooth trajectories with low noise levels are selected to minimize endpoint error and endpoint variability. The purpose of the study was to determine the contribution of trajectory smoothness to the endpoint accuracy and endpoint variability of rapid multi-joint arm movements. Young and older adults performed arm movements (4 blocks of 25 trials) as fast and as accurately as possible to a target with the right (dominant) arm. Endpoint accuracy and endpoint variability along with trajectory smoothness and error were quantified for each block of trials. Endpoint error and endpoint variance were greater in older adults compared with young adults, but decreased at a similar rate with practice for the two age groups. The greater endpoint error and endpoint variance exhibited by older adults were primarily due to impairments in movement extent control and not movement direction control. The normalized jerk was similar for the two age groups, but was not strongly associated with endpoint error or endpoint variance for either group. However, endpoint variance was strongly associated with endpoint error for both the young and older adults. Finally, trajectory error was similar for both groups and was weakly associated with endpoint error for the older adults. The findings are not consistent with the predictions of the minimum variance theory, but support and extend previous observations that movement trajectories and endpoints are planned independently. PMID:23584101

Cognitive and Neural Effects of Semantic Encoding Strategy Training in Older Adults

PubMed Central

Anderson, B. A.; Barch, D. M.; Jacoby, L. L.

2012-01-01

Prior research suggests that older adults are less likely than young adults to use effective learning strategies during intentional encoding. This functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) study investigated whether training older adults to use semantic encoding strategies can increase their self-initiated use of these strategies and improve their recognition memory. The effects of training on older adults' brain activity during intentional encoding were also examined. Training increased older adults' self-initiated semantic encoding strategy use and eliminated pretraining age differences in recognition memory following intentional encoding. Training also increased older adults' brain activity in the medial superior frontal gyrus, right precentral gyrus, and left caudate during intentional encoding. In addition, older adults' training-related changes in recognition memory were strongly correlated with training-related changes in brain activity in prefrontal and left lateral temporal regions associated with semantic processing and self-initiated verbal encoding strategy use in young adults. These neuroimaging results demonstrate that semantic encoding strategy training can alter older adults' brain activity patterns during intentional encoding and suggest that young and older adults may use the same network of brain regions to support self-initiated use of verbal encoding strategies. PMID:21709173

Aging in Movement Representations for Sequential Finger Movements: A Comparison between Young-, Middle-Aged, and Older Adults

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Cacola, Priscila; Roberson, Jerroed; Gabbard, Carl

2013-01-01

Studies show that as we enter older adulthood (greater than 64 years), our ability to mentally represent action in the form of using motor imagery declines. Using a chronometry paradigm to compare the movement duration of imagined and executed movements, we tested young-, middle-aged, and older adults on their ability to perform sequential finger…

Comparing young adults to older adults in e-cigarette perceptions and motivations for use: implications for health communication.

PubMed

Cooper, Maria; Harrell, Melissa B; Perry, Cheryl L

2016-08-01

Use of electronic cigarettes ('e-cigarettes' is rapidly rising, and is especially prevalent among young adults. A better understanding of e-cigarette perceptions and motivations for use is needed to inform health communication and educational efforts. This study aims to explore these aspects of use with a focus on comparing young adults to older adults. In this qualitative study, the investigator conducted semi-structured interviews among a purposive sample of e-cigarette users. Thematic content analysis was used to analyze qualitative data and document themes. e-cigarettes were most commonly used for smoking cessation among both age groups. Young adults described other motivations for use including doing smoke tricks, being able to consume a wide variety of flavors, and helping them study. Some interviewees (11%) believed e-cigarettes were a healthy alternative to conventional cigarettes, while many other users (30%) expressed concerns about the unknown risks of e-cigarettes. Findings were generally consistent across both age groups in their perceptions of harm from e-cigarettes and in subjective effects such as perceived addictiveness. However, individuals under 30 described unique motivations for e-cigarette use. Health messaging targeted to young adults should emphasize the potential health risks of e-cigarette use and recognize their distinct motivational aspects. © The Author 2016. Published by Oxford University Press. All rights reserved. For permissions, please email: journals.permissions@oup.com.

Timing of Reflexive Visuospatial Orienting in Young, Young-Old, and Old-Old Adults

PubMed Central

Langley, Linda K.; Friesen, Chris Kelland; Saville, Alyson L.; Ciernia, Annie T.

2012-01-01

This study examined adult age differences in reflexive orienting to two types of uninformative spatial cues: central arrows and peripheral onsets. In two experiments using a Posner cuing task, young adults (ages 18 – 28 yrs), young-old adults (ages 60 – 74 yrs), and old-old adults (ages 75 – 92 yrs) responded to targets that were preceded 100–1,000 ms earlier by a central arrow or a peripheral abrupt onset. In Experiment 1, the cue remained present upon target onset. Facilitation effects at early cue-target stimulus onset asynchronies (SOAs) were prolonged in duration for the two older groups relative to the young adults. At later cue-target SOAs, inhibition of return (IOR) that was initiated by peripheral onset cues was observed in the performance of young adults but not in that of the two older groups. In Experiment 2, the cue was presented briefly and removed prior to target onset. The change in cue duration minimized age differences (particularly for young-old adults) in facilitation effects and led to IOR for all three age groups. The findings are consistent with the idea that attentional control settings change with age, with higher settings for older adults leading to delayed disengagement from spatial cues. PMID:21394555

Developing a Tool for Measuring the Decision-Making Competence of Older Adults

PubMed Central

Finucane, Melissa L.; Gullion, Christina M.

2010-01-01

The authors evaluated the reliability and validity of a tool for measuring older adults’ decision-making competence (DMC). Two-hundred-five younger adults (25-45 years), 208 young-older adults (65-74 years), and 198 old-older adults (75-97 years) made judgments and decisions related to health, finance, and nutrition. Reliable indices of comprehension, dimension weighting, and cognitive reflection were developed. Unlike previous research, the authors were able to compare old-older with young-older adults’ performance. As hypothesized, old-older adults performed more poorly than young-older adults; both groups of older adults performed more poorly than younger adults. Hierarchical regression analyses showed that a large amount of variance in decision performance across age groups (including mean trends) could be accounted for by social variables, health measures, basic cognitive skills, attitudinal measures, and numeracy. Structural equation modeling revealed significant pathways from three exogenous latent factors (crystallized intelligence, other cognitive abilities, and age) to the endogenous DMC latent factor. Further research is needed to validate the meaning of performance on these tasks for real-life decision making. PMID:20545413

The Effects of Avatars' Age on Older Adults' Self-Disclosure and Trust.

PubMed

Lee, Yu-Hao; Xiao, Min; Wells, Robert H

2018-03-01

Older adults are increasingly interacting with other people online via virtual avatars, yet little is known about how avatars affect older adults' behavior. This study examines how interacting avatars' age affects older adult's self-disclosure and trust in a relation-building context. Previous studies have found that users can take on behaviors consistent with characteristics of the avatars. In social interactions, people also assess their avatar in relation to other avatars for similarity or differences. We conducted a 2 (self-avatar: old vs. young) × 2 (other's avatar: old vs. young) experiment with older-adult participants aged 60+ (n = 95). The findings show that using younger avatars did not increase self-disclosure. However, the older-adult participants disclosed more information when their avatar's age matched their partner avatar's age (i.e., old to old, young to young). They also trust their partners more when the interacting avatars shared similar age. This study provides theoretical insights into the role of avatars in online relationship-building and extends our understanding of the avatar effects on older adults.

Flavored e-cigarette use: Characterizing youth, young adult, and adult users.

PubMed

Harrell, M B; Weaver, S R; Loukas, A; Creamer, M; Marti, C N; Jackson, C D; Heath, J W; Nayak, P; Perry, C L; Pechacek, T F; Eriksen, M P

2017-03-01

The purpose of this study is to investigate how the use of flavored e-cigarettes varies between youth (12-17 years old), young adults (18-29 years old), and older adults (30 + years old). Cross-sectional surveys of school-going youth ( n  = 3907) and young adult college students ( n  = 5482) in Texas, and young adults and older adults ( n  = 6051) nationwide were administered in 2014-2015. Proportions and 95% confidence intervals were used to describe the percentage of e-cigarette use at initiation and in the past 30 days that was flavored, among current e-cigarette users. Chi-square tests were applied to examine differences by combustible tobacco product use and demographic factors. Most e-cigarette users said their first and "usual" e-cigarettes were flavored. At initiation, the majority of Texas school-going youth (98%), Texas young adult college students (95%), and young adults (71.2%) nationwide said their first e-cigarettes were flavored to taste like something other than tobacco, compared to 44.1% of older adults nationwide. Fruit and candy flavors predominated for all groups; and, for youth, flavors were an especially salient reason to use e-cigarettes. Among adults, the use of tobacco flavor at initiation was common among dual users (e-cigarettes + combustible tobacco), while other flavors were more common among former cigarette smokers (P = 0.03). Restricting the range of e-cigarette flavors (e.g., eliminating sweet flavors, like fruit and candy) may benefit youth and young adult prevention efforts. However, it is unclear what impact this change would have on adult smoking cessation.

Sleep does not facilitate insight in older adults.

PubMed

Debarnot, Ursula; Rossi, Marta; Faraguna, Ugo; Schwartz, Sophie; Sebastiani, Laura

2017-04-01

Sleep has been shown to foster the process of insight generation in young adults during problem solving activities. Aging is characterized by substantial changes in sleep architecture altering memory consolidation. Whether sleep might promote the occurrence of insight in older adults as well has not yet been tested experimentally. To address this issue, we tested healthy young and old volunteers on an insight problem solving task, involving both explicit and implicit features, before and after a night of sleep or a comparable wakefulness period. Data showed that insight emerged significantly less frequently after a night of sleep in older adults compared to young. Moreover, there was no difference in the magnitude of insight occurrence following sleep and daytime -consolidation in aged participants. We further found that acquisition of implicit knowledge in the task before sleep potentiated the gain of insight in young participants, but this effect was not observed in aged participants. Overall, present findings demonstrate that a period of sleep does not significantly promote insight in problem solving in older adults. Copyright © 2017 Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.

Talker Differences in Clear and Conversational Speech: Perceived Sentence Clarity for Young Adults with Normal Hearing and Older Adults with Hearing Loss

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Ferguson, Sarah Hargus; Morgan, Shae D.

2018-01-01

Purpose: The purpose of this study is to examine talker differences for subjectively rated speech clarity in clear versus conversational speech, to determine whether ratings differ for young adults with normal hearing (YNH listeners) and older adults with hearing impairment (OHI listeners), and to explore effects of certain talker characteristics…

Older adults do not notice their names: a new twist to a classic attention task.

PubMed

Naveh-Benjamin, Moshe; Kilb, Angela; Maddox, Geoffrey B; Thomas, Jenna; Fine, Hope C; Chen, Tina; Cowan, Nelson

2014-11-01

Although working memory spans are, on average, lower for older adults than young adults, we demonstrate in 5 experiments a way in which older adults paradoxically resemble higher capacity young adults. Specifically, in a selective-listening task, older adults almost always failed to notice their names presented in an unattended channel. This is an exaggeration of what high-span young adults show and the opposite of what low-span young adults show. This striking finding in older adults remained significant after controlling for working memory span and for noticing their names in an attended channel. The findings were replicated when presentation rate was slowed and when the ear in which the unattended name was presented was controlled. These results point to an account of older adults' performance involving not only an inhibition factor, which allows high-span young adults to suppress the channel to be ignored, but also an attentional capacity factor, with more unallocated capacity. This capacity allows low-span young adults to notice their names much more often than older adults with comparably low working memory spans do. PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2014 APA, all rights reserved.

Face likeability mediates the memory-enhancing effect of face attractiveness in young but not older adults.

PubMed

Lin, Tian; Lendry, Reesa; Ebner, Natalie C

2016-11-01

Evidence of effects of face attractiveness on memory is mixed and little is known about the underlying mechanisms of this relationship. Previous work suggests a possible mediating role of affective responding to faces (i.e., face likeability) on the relationship between face attractiveness and memory. Age-related change in social motivation may reduce the relevance of face attractiveness in older adults, with downstream effects on memory. In the present study, 50 young and 51 older participants were presented with face-trait pairs. Faces varied in attractiveness. Participants then completed a face-trait associative recognition memory task and provided likeability ratings for each face. There was a memory-enhancing effect of face attractiveness in young (but not older) participants, which was partially mediated by face likeability. In addition, more attractive and less attractive (compared to moderately attractive) faces were more likely remembered by both young and older participants. This quadratic effect of face attractiveness on memory was not mediated by face likeability. Findings are discussed in the context of motivational influences on memory that vary with age.

Relationships between strategy switching and strategy switch costs in young and older adults: a study in arithmetic problem solving.

PubMed

Taillan, Julien; Ardiale, Eléonore; Lemaire, Patrick

2015-01-01

BACKGROUND/STUDY CONTEXT: This study investigated age-related differences in within-item strategy switching (i.e., revising initial strategy choices to select a better strategy while solving a given problem) and in strategy switch costs (i.e., longer latencies when participants switch strategies than when they do not switch strategy during strategy execution). In a computational estimation task, participants had to give approximate products to two-digit multiplication problems (e.g., 41×67) while rounding up (i.e., do 50×70 for 41×67) or rounding down (i.e., do 40×60 for 41×67) operands to their nearest decades. After executing a cued strategy during 1000 ms, participants had the possibility to switch to another strategy (or repeat the same strategy) in a selection condition. In an execution condition, participants were forced to repeat the same strategy or to switch to another strategy. It was found that (1) older adults were less able than young adults to switch strategy after starting to execute a cued strategy (36.1% vs. 45.8%); (2) older adults showed larger switch costs than young adults (422 vs. 223 ms); and (3) strategy switches and strategy switch costs correlated in older adults but not in young adults. These findings have important implications for our understanding of the mechanisms underlying within-item strategy switching and aging effects on these mechanisms as well as, more generally, of strategic variations during cognitive aging.

Light touch compensates peripheral somatosensory degradation in postural control of older adults.

PubMed

Barela, Ana M F; Caporicci, Sarah; de Freitas, Paulo Barbosa; Jeka, John J; Barela, José A

2018-06-05

The present study aimed to investigate the sensitivity of detecting lower limb passive motion and use of additional sensory information from fingertip light touch for the postural control of older adults in comparison with young adults. A total of 11 older and 11 young adults (aged 68.1 ± 5.2 and 24.2 ± 2.2 years, respectively) underwent two tasks. We evaluated their sensitivity to passive ankle joint movement while seated in the first task. Participants then stood quietly on a force plate in a semi-tandem stance, for 30 s under two fingertip contact force conditions (no touch and light touch limited to 1 N). The results showed that the threshold of passive ankle displacement and body sway is higher in older adults than in young adults. The body sway reduced for both older and young adults with the addition of light touch at the fingertips. The maximum cross-correlation coefficient and time lags between body sway and fingertip light touch center of pressure was similar between both groups, suggesting that older adults used light touch to reduce body sway, similar to young adults. A higher threshold in detecting passive ankle joint movement may contribute to the increased body sway observed in older adults. These deficits may be compensated by additional sensory cues that would provide enhanced information used to control the upright stance. Copyright © 2018. Published by Elsevier B.V.

Adaptive constructive processes and memory accuracy: Consequences of counterfactual simulations in young and older adults

PubMed Central

Gerlach, Kathy D.; Dornblaser, David W.; Schacter, Daniel L.

2013-01-01

People frequently engage in counterfactual thinking: mental simulations of alternative outcomes to past events. Like simulations of future events, counterfactual simulations serve adaptive functions. However, future simulation can also result in various kinds of distortions and has thus been characterized as an adaptive constructive process. Here we approach counterfactual thinking as such and examine whether it can distort memory for actual events. In Experiments 1a/b, young and older adults imagined themselves experiencing different scenarios. Participants then imagined the same scenario again, engaged in no further simulation of a scenario, or imagined a counterfactual outcome. On a subsequent recognition test, participants were more likely to make false alarms to counterfactual lures than novel scenarios. Older adults were more prone to these memory errors than younger adults. In Experiment 2, younger and older participants selected and performed different actions, then recalled performing some of those actions, imagined performing alternative actions to some of the selected actions, and did not imagine others. Participants, especially older adults, were more likely to falsely remember counterfactual actions than novel actions as previously performed. The findings suggest that counterfactual thinking can cause source confusion based on internally generated misinformation, consistent with its characterization as an adaptive constructive process. PMID:23560477

Adaptive constructive processes and memory accuracy: consequences of counterfactual simulations in young and older adults.

PubMed

Gerlach, Kathy D; Dornblaser, David W; Schacter, Daniel L

2014-01-01

People frequently engage in counterfactual thinking: mental simulations of alternative outcomes to past events. Like simulations of future events, counterfactual simulations serve adaptive functions. However, future simulation can also result in various kinds of distortions and has thus been characterised as an adaptive constructive process. Here we approach counterfactual thinking as such and examine whether it can distort memory for actual events. In Experiments 1a/b young and older adults imagined themselves experiencing different scenarios. Participants then imagined the same scenario again, engaged in no further simulation of a scenario, or imagined a counterfactual outcome. On a subsequent recognition test participants were more likely to make false alarms to counterfactual lures than novel scenarios. Older adults were more prone to these memory errors than younger adults. In Experiment 2 younger and older participants selected and performed different actions, then recalled performing some of those actions, imagined performing alternative actions to some of the selected actions, and did not imagine others. Participants, especially older adults, were more likely to falsely remember counterfactual actions than novel actions as previously performed. The findings suggest that counterfactual thinking can cause source confusion based on internally generated misinformation, consistent with its characterisation as an adaptive constructive process.

Do older adults perceive postural constraints for reach estimation?

PubMed

Cordova, Alberto; Gabbard, Carl

2014-01-01

BACKGROUND/STUDY CONTEXT: Recent evidence indicates that older persons have difficulty mentally representing intended movements. Furthermore, in an estimation of reach paradigm using motor imagery, a form of mental representation, older persons significantly overestimated their ability compared with young adults. The authors tested the notion that older adults may also have difficulty perceiving the postural constraints associated with reach estimation. The authors compared young (Mage = 22 years) and older (Mage = 67) adults on reach estimation while seated and in a more postural demanding standing and leaning forward position. The expectation was a significant postural effect with the standing condition, as evidenced by reduced overestimation. Whereas there was no difference between groups in the seated condition (both overestimated), older adults underestimated whereas the younger group once again overestimated in the standing condition. From one perspective, these results show that older adults do perceive postural constraints in light of their own physical capabilities. That is, that group perceived greater postural demands with the standing posture and elected to program a more conservative strategy, resulting in underestimation.

Differences in Risk Aversion between Young and Older Adults.

PubMed

Albert, Steven M; Duffy, John

2012-01-15

Research on decision-making strategies among younger and older adults suggests that older adults may be more risk averse than younger people in the case of potential losses. These results mostly come from experimental studies involving gambling paradigms. Since these paradigms involve substantial demands on memory and learning, differences in risk aversion or other features of decision-making attributed to age may in fact reflect age-related declines in cognitive abilities. In the current study, older and younger adults completed a simpler, paired lottery choice task used in the experimental economics literature to elicit risk aversion. A similar approach was used to elicit participants' discount rates. The older adult group was more risk averse than younger adults (p < .05) and also had a higher discount rate (15.6-21.0% vs. 10.3-15.5%, p < .01), indicating lower expected utility from future income. Risk aversion and implied discount rates were weakly correlated. It may be valuable to investigate developmental changes in neural correlates of decision-making across the lifespan.

Differences in Risk Aversion between Young and Older Adults

PubMed Central

Albert, Steven M.; Duffy, John

2013-01-01

Research on decision-making strategies among younger and older adults suggests that older adults may be more risk averse than younger people in the case of potential losses. These results mostly come from experimental studies involving gambling paradigms. Since these paradigms involve substantial demands on memory and learning, differences in risk aversion or other features of decision-making attributed to age may in fact reflect age-related declines in cognitive abilities. In the current study, older and younger adults completed a simpler, paired lottery choice task used in the experimental economics literature to elicit risk aversion. A similar approach was used to elicit participants' discount rates. The older adult group was more risk averse than younger adults (p < .05) and also had a higher discount rate (15.6-21.0% vs. 10.3-15.5%, p < .01), indicating lower expected utility from future income. Risk aversion and implied discount rates were weakly correlated. It may be valuable to investigate developmental changes in neural correlates of decision-making across the lifespan. PMID:24319671

The use of illustration to improve older adults' comprehension of health-related information: is it helpful?

PubMed

Liu, Chiung-ju; Kemper, Susan; McDowd, Joan

2009-08-01

To examine whether explanatory illustrations can improve older adults' comprehension of written health information. Six short health-related texts were selected from websites and pamphlets. Young and older adults were randomly assigned to read health-related texts alone or texts accompanied by explanatory illustrations. Eye movements were recorded while reading. Word recognition, text comprehension, and comprehension of the illustrations were assessed after reading. Older adults performed as well as or better than young adults on the word recognition and text comprehension measures. However, older adults performed less well than young adults on the illustration comprehension measures. Analysis of readers' eye movements showed that older adults spent more time reading illustration-related phrases and fixating on the illustrations than did young adults, yet had poorer comprehension of the illustrations. Older adults might not benefit from text illustrations because illustrations can be difficult to integrate with the text. Health practitioners should not assume that illustrations will increase older adults' comprehension of health information.

Sleep benefits consolidation of visuo-motor adaptation learning in older adults.

PubMed

Mantua, Janna; Baran, Bengi; Spencer, Rebecca M C

2016-02-01

Sleep is beneficial for performance across a range of memory tasks in young adults, but whether memories are similarly consolidated in older adults is less clear. Performance benefits have been observed following sleep in older adults for declarative learning tasks, but this benefit may be reduced for non-declarative, motor skill learning tasks. To date, studies of sleep-dependent consolidation of motor learning in older adults are limited to motor sequence tasks. To examine whether reduced sleep-dependent consolidation in older adults is generalizable to other forms of motor skill learning, we examined performance changes over intervals of sleep and wake in young (n = 62) and older adults (n = 61) using a mirror-tracing task, which assesses visuo-motor adaptation learning. Participants learned the task either in the morning or in evening, and performance was assessed following a 12-h interval containing overnight sleep or daytime wake. Contrary to our prediction, both young adults and older adults exhibited sleep-dependent gains in visuo-motor adaptation. There was a correlation between performance improvement over sleep and percent of the night in non-REM stage 2 sleep. These results indicate that motor skill consolidation remains intact with increasing age although this relationship may be limited to specific forms of motor skill learning.

Effects of pointing compared with naming and observing during encoding on item and source memory in young and older adults.

PubMed

Ouwehand, Kim; van Gog, Tamara; Paas, Fred

2016-10-01

Research showed that source memory functioning declines with ageing. Evidence suggests that encoding visual stimuli with manual pointing in addition to visual observation can have a positive effect on spatial memory compared with visual observation only. The present study investigated whether pointing at picture locations during encoding would lead to better spatial source memory than naming (Experiment 1) and visual observation only (Experiment 2) in young and older adults. Experiment 3 investigated whether response modality during the test phase would influence spatial source memory performance. Experiments 1 and 2 supported the hypothesis that pointing during encoding led to better source memory for picture locations than naming or observation only. Young adults outperformed older adults on the source memory but not the item memory task in both Experiments 1 and 2. In Experiments 1 and 2, participants manually responded in the test phase. Experiment 3 showed that if participants had to verbally respond in the test phase, the positive effect of pointing compared with naming during encoding disappeared. The results suggest that pointing at picture locations during encoding can enhance spatial source memory in both young and older adults, but only if the response modality is congruent in the test phase.

Judgments of Emotion in Clear and Conversational Speech by Young Adults with Normal Hearing and Older Adults with Hearing Impairment

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Morgan, Shae D.; Ferguson, Sarah Hargus

2017-01-01

Purpose: In this study, we investigated the emotion perceived by young listeners with normal hearing (YNH listeners) and older adults with hearing impairment (OHI listeners) when listening to speech produced conversationally or in a clear speaking style. Method: The first experiment included 18 YNH listeners, and the second included 10 additional…

Minimum toe clearance events in divided attention treadmill walking in older and young adults: a cross-sectional study.

PubMed

Santhiranayagam, Braveena K; Lai, Daniel T H; Sparrow, W A; Begg, Rezaul K

2015-07-12

Falls in older adults during walking frequently occur while performing a concurrent task; that is, dividing attention to respond to other demands in the environment. A particularly hazardous fall-related event is tripping due to toe-ground contact during the swing phase of the gait cycle. The aim of this experiment was to determine the effects of divided attention on tripping risk by investigating the gait cycle event Minimum Toe Clearance (MTC). Fifteen older adults (mean 73.1 years) and 15 young controls (mean 26.1 years) performed three walking tasks on motorized treadmill: (i) at preferred walking speed (preferred walking), (ii) while carrying a glass of water at a comfortable walking speed (dual task walking), and (iii) speed-matched control walking without the glass of water (control walking). Position-time coordinates of the toe were acquired using a 3 dimensional motion capture system (Optotrak NDI, Canada). When MTC was present, toe height at MTC (MTC_Height) and MTC timing (MTC_Time) were calculated. The proportion of non-MTC gait cycles was computed and for non-MTC gait cycles, toe-height was extracted at the mean MTC_Time. Both groups maintained mean MTC_Height across all three conditions. Despite greater MTC_Height SD in preferred gait, the older group reduced their variability to match the young group in dual task walking. Compared to preferred speed walking, both groups attained MTC earlier in dual task and control conditions. The older group's MTC_Time SD was greater across all conditions; in dual task walking, however, they approximated the young group's SD. Non-MTC gait cycles were more frequent in the older group across walking conditions (for example, in preferred walking: young - 2.9 %; older - 18.7 %). In response to increased attention demands older adults preserve MTC_Height but exercise greater control of the critical MTC event by reducing variability in both MTC_Height and MTC_Time. A further adaptive locomotor control strategy to reduce

Older Adults Do Not Notice Their Names: A New Twist to a Classic Attention Task

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Naveh-Benjamin, Moshe; Kilb, Angela; Maddox, Geoffrey B.; Thomas, Jenna; Fine, Hope C.; Chen, Tina; Cowan, Nelson

2014-01-01

Although working memory spans are, on average, lower for older adults than young adults, we demonstrate in 5 experiments a way in which older adults paradoxically resemble higher capacity young adults. Specifically, in a selective-listening task, older adults almost always failed to notice their names presented in an unattended channel. This is an…

The psychological distance of memories: Examining causal relations with mood and self-esteem in young, middle-aged and older adults.

PubMed

Demiray, Burcu; Freund, Alexandra M

2017-03-01

Three studies examined the self-enhancement function of autobiographical memory (measured with subjective temporal distance of memories). Participants recalled a memory of an attained and a failed goal and rated the subjective distance between each memory and the present. Study 1 showed that young adults with higher self-esteem felt closer to memories of attained goals and farther from failure memories than those with lower self-esteem. In Study 2, young, middle-aged and older adults with higher self-esteem felt closer to success memories, whereas self-esteem was unrelated to the temporal distance of failure memories. In both studies, feeling closer to success memories (and far from failure) led to enhanced mood. In Study 3, state self-esteem was experimentally manipulated. The manipulation had no effect on young and older adults, but middle-aged adults whose self-esteem was decreased, felt closer to success memories than failure memories. Results are discussed in relation to the temporal self-appraisal theory. Copyright © 2017 Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.

Suicide in older adults: differences between the young-old, middle-old, and oldest old.

PubMed

Koo, Yu Wen; Kõlves, Kairi; De Leo, Diego

2017-08-01

In the limited research into suicides in older adults, they have been treated as a homogenous group without distinguishing between different age groups. This study aimed to compare differences in sociodemographic variables, recent life events, and mental and physical illnesses between three age groups within older adults who died by suicide: young-old (65-74 years), middle-old (75-84 years), and oldest old (85 years and over) in Queensland, Australia, during the years 2000-2012 (N = 978). The Queensland Suicide Register was utilized for the analysis. Annual suicide rates were calculated. Odds ratios with 95% confidence intervals and χ 2 tests for trend were calculated to examine differences between the three groups. Suicide rates were increasing with age for males, but not for females. Hanging and firearms were the predominant methods of suicides. However, suffocation by plastic bag and drowning as suicide methods increased with age, in contrast firearms and explosives decreased with age. Overall, psychiatric problems, suicidal behavior, legal and financial stressors, and relationship problems decreased significantly with age, meanwhile physical conditions and bereavement increased with age. Suicide across older adulthood is not a homogenous phenomenon. Our findings showed significant differences in the prevalence of potential risk factors within the three different age groups considered. To prevent suicide in older adults would require targeting specific factors for each subgroup while using holistic and comprehensive approaches.

Cycling efficiency and energy cost of walking in young and older adults.

PubMed

Gaesser, Glenn A; Tucker, Wesley J; Sawyer, Brandon J; Bhammar, Dharini M; Angadi, Siddhartha S

2018-02-01

To determine whether age affects cycling efficiency and the energy cost of walking (Cw), 190 healthy adults, ages 18-81 yr, cycled on an ergometer at 50 W and walked on a treadmill at 1.34 m/s. Ventilation and gas exchange at rest and during exercise were used to calculate net Cw and net efficiency of cycling. Compared with the 18-40 yr age group (2.17 ± 0.33 J·kg -1 ·m -1 ), net Cw was not different in the 60-64 yr (2.20 ± 0.40 J·kg -1 ·m -1 ) and 65-69 yr (2.20 ± 0.28 J·kg -1 ·m -1 ) age groups, but was significantly ( P < 0.03) higher in the ≥70 yr (2.37 ± 0.33 J·kg -1 ·m -1 ) age group. For subjects >60 yr, net Cw was significantly correlated with age ( R 2  = 0.123; P = 0.002). Cycling net efficiency was not different between 18-40 yr (23.5 ± 2.9%), 60-64 yr (24.5 ± 3.6%), 65-69 yr (23.3 ± 3.6%) and ≥70 yr (24.7 ± 2.7%) age groups. Repeat tests on a subset of subjects (walking, n = 43; cycling, n = 37) demonstrated high test-retest reliability [intraclass correlation coefficients (ICC), 0.74-0.86] for all energy outcome measures except cycling net energy expenditure (ICC = 0.54) and net efficiency (ICC = 0.50). Coefficients of variation for all variables ranged from 3.1 to 7.7%. Considerable individual variation in Cw and efficiency was evident, with a ~2-fold difference between the least and most economical/efficient subjects. We conclude that, between 18 and 81 yr, net Cw was only higher for ages ≥70 yr, and that cycling net efficiency was not different across age groups. NEW & NOTEWORTHY This study illustrates that the higher energy cost of walking in older adults is only evident for ages ≥70 yr. For older adults ages 60-69 yr, the energy cost of walking is similar to that of young adults. Cycling efficiency, by contrast, is not different across age groups. Considerable individual variation (∼2-fold) in cycling efficiency and energy cost of walking is observed in young and older adults.

Older Adults Make Less Advantageous Decisions than Younger Adults: Cognitive and Psychological Correlates

PubMed Central

Fein, George; McGillivray, Shannon; Finn, Peter

2007-01-01

This study tested the hypotheses that older adults make less advantageous decisions than younger adults on the Iowa gambling task (IGT). Less advantageous decisions, as measured by the IGT, are characterized by choices that favor larger versus smaller immediate rewards, even though such choices may result in long-term negative consequences. The IGT, and measures of neuropsychological function, personality, and psychopathology were administered to 164 healthy adults 18–85 years of age. Older adults performed less advantageously on the IGT compared with younger adults. Additionally, a greater number of older adult’s IGT performances were classified as ‘impaired’ when compared to younger adults. Less advantageous decisions were associated with obsessive symptoms in older adults and with antisocial symptoms in younger adults. Performance on the IGT was positively associated with auditory working memory and psychomotor function in young adults, and in immediate memory in older adults. PMID:17445297

Variability in common synaptic input to motor neurons modulates both force steadiness and pegboard time in young and older adults.

PubMed

Feeney, Daniel F; Mani, Diba; Enoka, Roger M

2018-06-07

We investigated the associations between grooved pegboard times, force steadiness (coefficient of variation for force), and variability in an estimate of the common synaptic input to motor neurons innervating the wrist extensor muscles during steady contractions performed by young and older adults. The discharge times of motor units were derived from recordings obtained with high-density surface electrodes while participants performed steady isometric contractions at 10% and 20% of maximal voluntary contraction (MVC) force. The steady contractions were performed with a pinch grip and wrist extension, both independently (single action) and concurrently (double action). The variance in common synaptic input to motor neurons was estimated with a state-space model of the latent common input dynamics. There was a statistically significant association between the coefficient of variation for force during the steady contractions and the estimated variance in common synaptic input in young (r 2 = 0.31) and older (r 2 = 0.39) adults, but not between either the mean or the coefficient of variation for interspike interval of single motor units with the coefficient of variation for force. Moreover, the estimated variance in common synaptic input during the double-action task with the wrist extensors at the 20% target was significantly associated with grooved pegboard time (r 2 = 0.47) for older adults, but not young adults. These findings indicate that longer pegboard times of older adults were associated with worse force steadiness and greater fluctuations in the estimated common synaptic input to motor neurons during steady contractions. This article is protected by copyright. All rights reserved. This article is protected by copyright. All rights reserved.

Do Young and Older Adults Rely on Different Processes in Source Memory Tasks? A Neuropsychological Study

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Glisky, Elizabeth L.; Kong, Lauren L.

2008-01-01

Source memory has consistently been associated with prefrontal function in both normal and clinical populations. Nevertheless, the exact contribution of this brain region to source memory remains uncertain, and evidence suggests that processes used by young and older adults may differ. The authors explored the extent to which scores on composite…

The Role of Shifting, Updating, and Inhibition in Prospective Memory Performance in Young and Older Adults

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Schnitzspahn, Katharina M.; Stahl, Christoph; Zeintl, Melanie; Kaller, Christoph P.; Kliegel, Matthias

2013-01-01

Prospective memory performance shows a decline in late adulthood. The present article examines the role of 3 main executive function facets (i.e., shifting, updating, and inhibition) as possible developmental mechanisms associated with these age effects. One hundred seventy-five young and 110 older adults performed a battery of cognitive tests…

Factors Affecting Sentence Severity for Young Adult Offenders.

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Greenwood, Peter W.; And Others

This document analyzes the sentencing of young adult defendants in comparison with older adult and younger juvenile offenders, and disputes prior research which held that young adults received more lenient sentencing, perhaps because of the restrictions on disclosing juvenile delinquency histories. The document presents data from samples of young…

Older Adults' Comprehension of Transformational and Deactivation Negation

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Margolin, Sara J.

2015-01-01

The present research aimed to examine young and older adults' comprehension of negated text to determine the locus of older adults' difficulty in understanding this text construction. Participants were asked to read short passages at their own pace, complete a lexical decision task, and answer a comprehension question about what they had read.…

Haemodynamics of aerobic and resistance blood flow restriction exercise in young and older adults.

PubMed

Staunton, Craig A; May, Anthony K; Brandner, Christopher R; Warmington, Stuart A

2015-11-01

Light-load blood flow restriction exercise (BFRE) may provide a novel training method to limit the effects of age-related muscle atrophy in older adults. Therefore, the purpose of this study was to compare the haemodynamic response to resistance and aerobic BFRE between young adults (YA; n = 11; 22 ± 1 years) and older adults (OA; n = 13; 69 ± 1 years). On two occasions, participants completed BFRE or control exercise (CON). One occasion was leg press (LP; 20 % 1-RM) and the other was treadmill walking (TM; 4 km h(-1)). Haemodynamic responses (HR, Q, SV and BP) were recorded during baseline and exercise. At baseline, YA and OA were different for some haemodynamic parameters (e.g. BP, SV). The relative responses to BFRE were similar between YA and OA. Blood pressures increased more with BFRE, and also for LP over TM. Q increased similarly for BFRE and CON (in both LP and TM), but with elevated HR and reduced SV (TM only). While BFR conferred slightly greater haemodynamic stress than CON, this was lower for walking than leg-press exercise. Given similar response magnitudes between YA and OA, these data support aerobic exercise being a more appropriate BFRE for prescription in older adults that may contribute to limiting the effects of age-related muscle atrophy.

When we test, do we stress? Impact of the testing environment on cortisol secretion and memory performance in older adults.

PubMed

Sindi, Shireen; Fiocco, Alexandra J; Juster, Robert-Paul; Pruessner, Jens; Lupien, Sonia J

2013-08-01

The majority of studies find that older adults have worse memory performance than young adults. However, contextual features in the testing environment may be perceived as stressful by older adults, increasing their stress hormone levels. Given the evidence that older adults are highly sensitive to the effects of stress hormones (cortisol) on memory performance, it is postulated that a stressful testing environment in older adults can lead to an acute stress response and to memory impairments. The current study compared salivary cortisol levels and memory performance in young and older adults tested in environments manipulated to be stressful (unfavourable condition) or not stressful (favourable condition) for each age group. 28 young adults and 32 older adults were tested in two testing conditions: (1) a condition favouring young adults (constructed to be less stressful for young adults), and (2) a condition favouring older adults (constructed to be less stressful for older adults). The main outcome measure was salivary cortisol levels. Additionally, immediate and delayed memory performances were assessed during each condition. In older adults only, we found significantly high cortisol levels and low memory performance in the condition favouring young adults. In contrast, cortisol levels were lower and memory performance was better when older adults were tested in conditions favouring them. There was no effect of testing condition in young adults. The results demonstrate that older adults' memory performance is highly sensitive to the testing environment. These findings have important implications for both research and clinical settings in which older adults are tested for memory performance. Copyright © 2012 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

Attractiveness judgments and discrimination of mommies and grandmas: perceptual tuning for young adult faces.

PubMed

Short, Lindsey A; Mondloch, Catherine J; Hackland, Anne T

2015-01-01

Adults are more accurate in detecting deviations from normality in young adult faces than in older adult faces despite exhibiting comparable accuracy in discriminating both face ages. This deficit in judging the normality of older faces may be due to reliance on a face space optimized for the dimensions of young adult faces, perhaps because of early and continuous experience with young adult faces. Here we examined the emergence of this young adult face bias by testing 3- and 7-year-old children on a child-friendly version of the task used to test adults. In an attractiveness judgment task, children viewed young and older adult face pairs; each pair consisted of an unaltered face and a distorted face of the same identity. Children pointed to the prettiest face, which served as a measure of their sensitivity to the dimensions on which faces vary relative to a norm. To examine whether biases in the attractiveness task were specific to deficits in referencing a norm or extended to impaired discrimination, we tested children on a simultaneous match-to-sample task with the same stimuli. Both age groups were more accurate in judging the attractiveness of young faces relative to older faces; however, unlike adults, the young adult face bias extended to the match-to-sample task. These results suggest that by 3 years of age, children's perceptual system is more finely tuned for young adult faces than for older adult faces, which may support past findings of superior recognition for young adult faces. Copyright © 2014 Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.

Dual-Process Models of Associative Recognition in Young and Older Adults: Evidence from Receiver Operating Characteristics

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Healy, Michael R.; Light, Leah L.; Chung, Christie

2005-01-01

In 3 experiments, young and older adults studied lists of unrelated word pairs and were given confidence-rated item and associative recognition tests. Several different models of recognition were fit to the confidence-rating data using techniques described by S. Macho (2002, 2004). Concordant with previous findings, item recognition data were best…

Speed but not amplitude of visual feedback exacerbates force variability in older adults.

PubMed

Kim, Changki; Yacoubi, Basma; Christou, Evangelos A

2018-06-23

Magnification of visual feedback (VF) impairs force control in older adults. In this study, we aimed to determine whether the age-associated increase in force variability with magnification of visual feedback is a consequence of increased amplitude or speed of visual feedback. Seventeen young and 18 older adults performed a constant isometric force task with the index finger at 5% of MVC. We manipulated the vertical (force gain) and horizontal (time gain) aspect of the visual feedback so participants performed the task with the following VF conditions: (1) high amplitude-fast speed; (2) low amplitude-slow speed; (3) high amplitude-slow speed. Changing the visual feedback from low amplitude-slow speed to high amplitude-fast speed increased force variability in older adults but decreased it in young adults (P < 0.01). Changing the visual feedback from low amplitude-slow speed to high amplitude-slow speed did not alter force variability in older adults (P > 0.2), but decreased it in young adults (P < 0.01). Changing the visual feedback from high amplitude-slow speed to high amplitude-fast speed increased force variability in older adults (P < 0.01) but did not alter force variability in young adults (P > 0.2). In summary, increased force variability in older adults with magnification of visual feedback was evident only when the speed of visual feedback increased. Thus, we conclude that in older adults deficits in the rate of processing visual information and not deficits in the processing of more visual information impair force control.

When Distraction Holds Relevance: A Prospective Memory Benefit for Older Adults.

PubMed

Lourenço, Joana S; Maylor, Elizabeth A

2015-06-09

Evidence is accumulating to show that age-related increases in susceptibility to distracting information can benefit older more than young adults in several cognitive tasks. Here we focus on prospective memory (i.e., remembering to carry out future intentions) and examine the effect of presenting distracting information that is intention-related as a function of age. Young and older adults performed an ongoing 1-back working memory task to a rapid stream of pictures superimposed with to-be-ignored letter strings. Participants were additionally instructed to respond to target pictures (namely, animals) and, for half of the participants, some strings prior to the targets were intention-related words (i.e., animals). Results showed that presenting intention-related distracting information during the ongoing task was particularly advantageous for target detection in older compared to young adults. Moreover, a prospective memory benefit was observed even for older adults who showed no explicit memory for the target distracter words. We speculate that intention-related distracter information enhanced the accessibility of the prospective memory task and suggest that when distracting information holds relevance to intentions it can serve a compensatory role in prospective remembering in older adults.

Circulating levels of dickkopf-1, osteoprotegerin and sclerostin are higher in old compared with young men and women and positively associated with whole-body bone mineral density in older adults.

PubMed

Coulson, J; Bagley, L; Barnouin, Y; Bradburn, S; Butler-Browne, G; Gapeyeva, H; Hogrel, J-Y; Maden-Wilkinson, T; Maier, A B; Meskers, C; Murgatroyd, C; Narici, M; Pääsuke, M; Sassano, L; Sipilä, S; Al-Shanti, N; Stenroth, L; Jones, D A; McPhee, J S

2017-09-01

Bone mineral density declines with increasing older age. We examined the levels of circulating factors known to regulate bone metabolism in healthy young and older adults. The circulating levels of dickkopf-1, osteocalcin, osteoprotegerin and sclerostin were positively associated with whole-body bone mineral density (WBMD) in older adults, despite the average WBMD being lower and circulating dickkopf-1, osteoprotegerin and sclerostin being higher in old than young. This study aims to investigate the relationship between whole-body bone mineral density (WBMD) and levels of circulating factors with known roles in bone remodelling during 'healthy' ageing. WBMD and fasting plasma concentrations of dickkopf-1, fibroblast growth factor-23, osteocalcin, osteoprotegerin, osteopontin and sclerostin were measured in 272 older subjects (69 to 81 years; 52% female) and 171 younger subjects (18-30 years; 53% female). WBMD was lower in old than young. Circulating osteocalcin was lower in old compared with young, while dickkopf-1, osteoprotegerin and sclerostin were higher in old compared with young. These circulating factors were each positively associated with WBMD in the older adults and the relationships remained after adjustment for covariates (r values ranging from 0.174 to 0.254, all p < 0.01). In multivariate regression, the body mass index, circulating sclerostin and whole-body lean mass together accounted for 13.8% of the variation with WBMD in the older adults. In young adults, dickkopf-1 and body mass index together accounted for 7.7% of variation in WBMD. Circulating levels of dickkopf-1, osteocalcin, osteoprotegerin and sclerostin are positively associated with WBMD in community-dwelling older adults, despite the average WBMD being lower and circulating dickkopf-1, osteoprotegerin and sclerostin being higher in old than young.

Differences in chewing behaviors between healthy fully dentate young and older adults assessed by electromyographic recordings.

PubMed

Zhu, Yong; Hollis, James H

2015-01-01

To characterize changes in chewing behaviors associated with healthy aging, 10 young and 10 older fully dentate healthy participants were enrolled in this study. They chewed carrot samples that differed in hardness until their normal swallowing threshold. Their chewing behaviors were assessed using an electromyographic recording device. Adjusting for gender and body mass index, older adults had a higher number of chewing cycles (p = 0.020), a longer chewing duration (p < 0.001), a slower chewing rate (p = 0.002), a greater maximal electromyographic voltage (p = 0.003) and a greater muscle activity (p = 0.002) before they could comfortably swallow the food bolus. A statistically significant main effect of food hardness on the number of chewing cycles, chewing duration, chewing rate and muscle activity was also observed (p < 0.001 for all). These results suggest that reduced mastication efficiency is associated with healthy aging in fully dentate adults. This ingestive behavior may contribute to aging-related reduction in appetite in older adults.

Medication adherence and persistence over time with self-administered TNF-alpha inhibitors among young adult, middle-aged, and older patients with rheumatologic conditions.

PubMed

Calip, Gregory S; Adimadhyam, Sruthi; Xing, Shan; Rincon, Julian C; Lee, Wan-Ju; Anguiano, Rebekah H

2017-10-01

Self-injectable TNF inhibitors are increasingly used early in the chronic treatment of moderate to severe rheumatologic conditions. We estimated medication adherence/persistence over time following initiation in young adult and older adult patients with rheumatoid arthritis, ankylosing spondylitis or psoriatic arthritis. We conducted a retrospective cohort study of patients aged 18+ years newly initiating etanercept, adalimumab, certolizumab pegol, or golimumab using the Truven Health MarketScan Database between 2009 and 2013. Pharmacy dispensing data were used to calculate 12-month medication possession ratios (MPR) and determine adherence (MPR ≥ 0.80) for up to 3 years after starting therapy. Persistence over each 12-month interval was defined as not having a ≥92-day treatment gap. Multivariable generalized estimating equation models were used to calculate odds ratios (OR) and robust 95% confidence intervals (CI) for associations between patient characteristics and repeated adherence/persistence measures over time. Among 53,477 new users, 14% were young adults (18-34 years), 49% middle-aged (35-54 years), and 37% older adults (55+ years). Overall, 37% of patients were adherent and 83% were persistent in the first year of therapy. The lowest adherence (17%) and persistence (70%) were observed among young adult patients by Year +3. Compared to older adults, middle-aged (OR = 0.73, 95% CI: 0.71-0.76) and young adults (OR = 0.50, 95% CI: 0.47-0.53) were less likely to be adherent. Higher Charlson comorbidity scores, hospitalizations, and emergency department visits were associated with non-adherence/non-persistence. We observed low adherence to self-administered TNF inhibitors but most patients remained persistent over time. Further efforts to improve adherence in young adults and patients with greater comorbidity are needed. Copyright © 2017 Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.

Circadian and Wake-Dependent Influences on Subjective Sleepiness, Cognitive Throughput, and Reaction Time Performance in Older and Young Adults

PubMed Central

Silva, Edward J.; Wang, Wei; Ronda, Joseph M.; Wyatt, James K.; Duffy, Jeanne F.

2010-01-01

Study Objectives: To assess circadian and homeostatic influences on subjective sleepiness and cognitive performance in older adults when sleep and waking are scheduled at different times of day; to assess changes in subjective sleepiness and cognitive performance across several weeks of an inpatient study; and to compare these findings with results from younger adults. Design: Three 24-h baseline days consisting of 16 h of wakefulness and an 8-h sleep opportunity followed by 3-beat cycles of a 20-h forced desynchrony (FD) condition; 18 20-h “days,” each consisting of 13.33 h of scheduled wakefulness and 6.67 h of scheduled sleep opportunity. Setting: Intensive Physiological Monitoring Unit of the Brigham and Women's Hospital General Clinical Research Center. Participants: 10 healthy older adults (age 64.00 ± 5.98 y, 5 females) and 10 healthy younger adults (age 24.50 ± 3.54 y, 5 females). Interventions: Wake episodes during FD scheduled to begin 4 h earlier each day allowing for data collection at a full range of circadian phases. Measurements and Results: Subjective sleepiness, cognitive throughput, and psychomotor vigilance assessed every 2 h throughout the study. Core body temperature (CBT) data collected throughout to assess circadian phase. Older subjects were less sleepy and performed significantly better on reaction time (RT) measures than younger subjects. Decrements among younger subjects increased in magnitude further into the experiment, while the performance of older subjects remained stable. Conclusions: Our findings demonstrate that the waking performance and alertness of healthy older subjects are less impacted by the cumulative effects of repeated exposure to adverse circadian phase than that of young adults. This suggests that there are age-related changes in the circadian promotion of alertness, in the wake-dependent decline of alertness, and/or in how these 2 regulatory systems interact in healthy aging. Citation: Silva EJ; Wang W; Ronda JM

Influence of working memory and executive function on stair ascent and descent in young and older adults.

PubMed

Gaillardin, Florence; Baudry, Stéphane

2018-06-01

This study assessed the influence of attention division, working memory and executive function on stair ascent and descent in young and older adults. Twenty young (25.5 ± 2.1 yrs) and 20 older adults (68.4 ± 5.4 yrs) ascended and descended a 3-step staircase with no simultaneous cognitive task (single-motor task) or while performing a cognitive task (dual-task condition). The cognitive task involved either 1) recalling a word list of the subject's word-span minus 2 words (SPAN-2) to assess the attention division effect, 2) a word list of subject's word-span (SPAN-O) to assess the working memory effect, or 3) recalling in alphabetical order, a word list of the subject's word-span (SPAN-A) to assess the executive function effect. Word-span corresponds to the longest string of words that can be recalled correctly. The duration of ascent and descent of stairs was used to assess the cognitive-motor interaction. Stair ascent and descent duration did not differ between age groups for the single-motor task, and was similar between single-motor task and SPAN-2 in both groups (p > 0.05). In contrast, stair ascent and descent duration increased with SPAN-O compared with SPAN-2 for both groups (p < 0.01). Stair ascent (p = 0.017) and descent (p = 0.008) were longer in SPAN-A than SPAN-O only in older adults. Healthy aging was not associated with a decrease in the capacity to perform motor-cognitive dual tasks that involved ascending and descending of stairs when the cognitive task only required working memory. However, the decrease in dual-task performance involving executive functioning may reflect a subclinical cognitive decline in healthy older adults. Copyright © 2018 Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.

Leg and trunk muscle coordination and postural sway during increasingly difficult standing balance tasks in young and older adults.

PubMed

Donath, Lars; Kurz, Eduard; Roth, Ralf; Zahner, Lukas; Faude, Oliver

2016-09-01

Ageing impairs body balance and increases older adults' fall risk. Balance training can improve intrinsic fall risk factors. However, age comparisons of muscle activity responses during balance tasks are lacking. This study investigated relative muscle activity, muscle coordination and postural sway during various recommended static balance training tasks. Muscle activity (%MVC), amplitude ratios (AR) and co-activity (CAI) were determined during standing tasks for 30s (1: double limb stance on a foam surface, eyes open; 2: double limb stance on firm ground, eyes closed; 3: double limb stance, feet in step position on a foam surface, eyes open; 4: double limb stance, feet in step position on firm ground, eyes closed; 5: single limb stance on firm ground, eyes open) in 20 healthy young adults (24±2 y) and 20 older adults (73±6 y). Surface electromyography (SEMG) was applied (SENIAM guidelines) to ankle (tibialis anterior, soleus, medial gastrocnemius, peroneus longus) and thigh (vastus lateralis, vastus medialis, biceps femoris, semitendinosus) muscles (non-dominant leg). Electrodes over trunk (multifidus and internal oblique) muscles were applied bilaterally. Two- to six-fold higher levels of relative muscle activity were found in older adults for ankle (0.0002young adults for the trunk (0.001older adults for the ankle (0.009Older adults had higher electrophysiological costs for all stance conditions. Muscle coordination showed inverse activity patterns at the ankle and trunk. Optimal balance and strength training programs should take into account age-specific alterations in muscle activity. Copyright © 2016 Elsevier Ireland Ltd. All rights reserved.

Why do pictures, but not visual words, reduce older adults' false memories?

PubMed

Smith, Rebekah E; Hunt, R Reed; Dunlap, Kathryn R

2015-09-01

Prior work shows that false memories resulting from the study of associatively related lists are reduced for both young and older adults when the auditory presentation of study list words is accompanied by related pictures relative to when auditory word presentation is combined with visual presentation of the word. In contrast, young adults, but not older adults, show a reduction in false memories when presented with the visual word along with the auditory word relative to hearing the word only. In both cases of pictures relative to visual words and visual words relative to auditory words alone, the benefit of picture and visual words in reducing false memories has been explained in terms of monitoring for perceptual information. In our first experiment, we provide the first simultaneous comparison of all 3 study presentation modalities (auditory only, auditory plus visual word, and auditory plus picture). Young and older adults show a reduction in false memories in the auditory plus picture condition, but only young adults show a reduction in the visual word condition relative to the auditory only condition. A second experiment investigates whether older adults fail to show a reduction in false memory in the visual word condition because they do not encode perceptual information in the visual word condition. In addition, the second experiment provides evidence that the failure of older adults to show the benefits of visual word presentation is related to reduced cognitive resources. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2015 APA, all rights reserved).

Association between imagined and actual functional reach (FR): a comparison of young and older adults.

PubMed

Gabbard, Carl; Cordova, Alberto

2013-01-01

Recent studies indicate that the ability to mentally represent action using motor imagery declines with advanced age (>64 years). As the ability to represent action declines, the elderly may experience increasing difficulty with movement planning and execution. Here, we determined the association between estimation of reach via use of motor imagery and actual FR. Young adults (M=22 years) and older adults (M=66 years) estimated reach while standing with targets randomly presented in peripersonal (within actual reach) and extrapersonal (beyond reach) space. Imagined responses were compared to the individual's scaled maximum reach. FR, also while standing, was assessed using the standardized Functional Reach Test (FRT). Results for total score estimation accuracy showed that there was no difference for age; however, results for mean bias and distribution of error revealed that the older group underestimated while the younger group overestimated. In reference to FR, younger adults outperformed older adults (30 versus 14in.) and most prominent, only the younger group showed a significant relationship between estimation and FR. In addition to gaining insight to the effects of advanced age on the ability to mentally represent action and its association with movement execution, these results although preliminary, may have clinical implications based on the question of whether motor imagery training could improve movement estimations and how that might affect actual reach. Copyright © 2012 Elsevier Ireland Ltd. All rights reserved.

Interactive video dance games for healthy older adults.

PubMed

Studenski, S; Perera, S; Hile, E; Keller, V; Spadola-Bogard, J; Garcia, J

2010-12-01

Physical activity promotes health in older adults but participation rates are low. Interactive video dance games can increase activity in young persons but have not been designed for use with older adults. The purpose of this research was to evaluate healthy older adults' interest and participation in a dance game adapted for an older user. Healthy older adults were recruited from 3 senior living settings and offered three months of training and supervision using a video dance game designed for older people. Before and after the program, data was collected on vital signs, physical function and self reported quality of life. Feedback was obtained during and after training. Of 36 persons who entered (mean age 80.1 + 5.4 years, 83 % female), 25 completed the study. Completers were healthier than noncompleters. Completers showed gains in narrow walk time, self-reported balance confidence and mental health. While there were no serious adverse events, 4 of 11 noncompleters withdrew due to musculoskeletal complaints. Adapted Interactive video dance is feasible for some healthy older adults and may help achieve physical activity goals.

Does visual feedback during walking result in similar improvements in trunk control for young and older healthy adults?

PubMed

Anson, Eric; Rosenberg, Russell; Agada, Peter; Kiemel, Tim; Jeka, John

2013-11-26

Most current applications of visual feedback to improve postural control are limited to a fixed base of support and produce mixed results regarding improved postural control and transfer to functional tasks. Currently there are few options available to provide visual feedback regarding trunk motion while walking. We have developed a low cost platform to provide visual feedback of trunk motion during walking. Here we investigated whether augmented visual position feedback would reduce trunk movement variability in both young and older healthy adults. The subjects who participated were 10 young and 10 older adults. Subjects walked on a treadmill under conditions of visual position feedback and no feedback. The visual feedback consisted of anterior-posterior (AP) and medial-lateral (ML) position of the subject's trunk during treadmill walking. Fourier transforms of the AP and ML trunk kinematics were used to calculate power spectral densities which were integrated as frequency bins "below the gait cycle" and "gait cycle and above" for analysis purposes. Visual feedback reduced movement power at very low frequencies for lumbar and neck translation but not trunk angle in both age groups. At very low frequencies of body movement, older adults had equivalent levels of movement variability with feedback as young adults without feedback. Lower variability was specific to translational (not angular) trunk movement. Visual feedback did not affect any of the measured lower extremity gait pattern characteristics of either group, suggesting that changes were not invoked by a different gait pattern. Reduced translational variability while walking on the treadmill reflects more precise control maintaining a central position on the treadmill. Such feedback may provide an important technique to augment rehabilitation to minimize body translation while walking. Individuals with poor balance during walking may benefit from this type of training to enhance path consistency during over

Improving associative memory in older adults with unitization.

PubMed

Ahmad, Fahad N; Fernandes, Myra; Hockley, William E

2015-01-01

We examined if unitization inherent preexperimentally could reduce the associative deficit in older adults. In Experiment 1, younger and older adults studied compound word (CW; e.g., store keeper) and noncompound word (NCW; e.g., needle birth) pairs. We found a reduction in the age-related associative deficit such that older but not younger adults showed a discrimination advantage for CW relative to NCW pairs on a yes-no associative recognition test. These results suggest that CW compared to NCW word pairs provide schematic support that older adults can use to improve their memory. In Experiment 2, reducing study time in younger adults decreased associative recognition performance, but did not produce a discrimination advantage for CW pairs. In Experiment 3, both older and younger adults showed a discrimination advantage for CW pairs on a two-alternative forced-choice recognition test, which encourages greater use of familiarity. These results suggest that test format influenced young adults' use of familiarity during associative recognition of unitized pairs, and that older adults rely more on familiarity than recollection for associative recognition. Unitization of preexperimental associations, as in CW pairs, can alleviate age-related associative deficits.

Relative numerousness judgment and summation in young, middle-aged, and older adult orangutans (Pongo pygmaeus abelii and Pongo pygmaeus pygmaeus).

PubMed

Anderson, Ursula S; Stoinski, Tara S; Bloomsmith, Mollie A; Maple, Terry L

2007-02-01

The ability to select the larger of two quantities ranging from 1 to 5 (relative numerousness judgment [RNJ[) and the ability to select the larger of two pairs of quantities with each pair ranging from 1 to 8 (summation) were evaluated in young, middle-aged, and older adult orangutans (7 Pongo pygmaeus abelii and 2 Pongo pygmaeus pygmaeus). Summation accuracy and RNJ were similar to those of previous reports in apes; however, the pattern of age-related differences with regard to these tasks was different from that previously reported in gorillas. Older orangutans were less accurate than the young and middle-aged for RNJ, and summation accuracy was equivalent among age groups. Evidence was found to suggest that the young and middle-aged based their selection of the largest quantity pair on both quantities within each pair during the summation task. These results show a relationship between subject age and the quantitative abilities of adult orangutans.

Social relevance enhances memory for impressions in older adults.

PubMed

Cassidy, Brittany S; Gutchess, Angela H

2012-01-01

Previous research has demonstrated that older adults have difficulty retrieving contextual material over items alone. Recent research suggests this deficit can be reduced by adding emotional context, allowing for the possibility that memory for social impressions may show less age-related decline than memory for other types of contextual information. Two studies investigated how orienting to social or self-relevant aspects of information contributed to the learning and retrieval of impressions in young and older adults. Participants encoded impressions of others in conditions varying in the use of self-reference (Experiment 1) and interpersonal meaningfulness (Experiment 2), and completed memory tasks requiring the retrieval of specific traits. For both experiments, age groups remembered similar numbers of impressions. In Experiment 1 using more self-relevant encoding contexts increased memory for impressions over orienting to stimuli in a non-social way, regardless of age. In Experiment 2 older adults had enhanced memory for impressions presented in an interpersonally meaningful relative to a personally irrelevant way, whereas young adults were unaffected by this manipulation. The results provide evidence that increasing social relevance ameliorates age differences in memory for impressions, and enhances older adults' ability to successfully retrieve contextual information.

Relationships between regional cerebellar volume and sensorimotor and cognitive function in young and older adults

PubMed Central

Bernard, Jessica A.; Seidler, Rachael D.

2013-01-01

The cerebellum has been implicated in both sensorimotor and cognitive function, but is known to undergo volumetric declines with advanced age. Individual differences in regional cerebellar volume may therefore provide insight into performance variability across the lifespan, as has been shown with other brain structures and behaviors. Here, we investigated whether there are regional age differences in cerebellar volume in young and older adults, and whether these volumes explain, in part, individual differences in sensorimotor and cognitive task performance. We found that older adults had smaller cerebellar volume than young adults; specifically, lobules in the anterior cerebellum were more impacted by age. Multiple regression analyses for both age groups revealed associations between sensorimotor task performance in several domains (balance, choice reaction time, and timing) and regional cerebellar volume. There were also relationships with working memory, but none with measures of general cognitive or executive function. Follow-up analyses revealed several differential relationships with age between regional volume and sensorimotor performance. These relationships were predominantly selective to cerebellar regions that have been implicated in cognitive functions. Therefore, it may be the cognitive aspects of sensorimotor task performance that are best explained by individual differences in regional cerebellar volumes. In sum, our results demonstrate the importance of regional cerebellar volume with respect to both sensorimotor and cognitive performance, and we provide additional insight into the role of the cerebellum in age-related performance declines. PMID:23625382

Narrative Discourse in Young and Older Adults: Behavioral and NIRS Analyses.

PubMed

Martin, Charles-Olivier; Pontbriand-Drolet, Stéphanie; Daoust, Valérie; Yamga, Eric; Amiri, Mahnoush; Hübner, Lilian C; Ska, Bernadette

2018-01-01

Discourse comprehension is at the core of communication capabilities, making it an important component of elderly populations' quality of life. The aim of this study is to evaluate changes in discourse comprehension and the underlying brain activity. Thirty-six participants read short stories and answered related probes in three conditions: micropropositions, macropropositions and situation models. Using near-infrared spectroscopy (NIRS), the variation in oxyhemoglobin (HbO 2 ) and deoxyhemoglobin (HbR) concentrations was assessed throughout the task. The results revealed that the older adults performed with equivalent accuracy to the young ones at the macroproposition level of discourse comprehension, but were less accurate at the microproposition and situation model levels. Similar to what is described in the compensation-related utilization of neural circuits hypothesis (CRUNCH) model, older participants tended to have greater activation in the left dorsolateral prefrontal cortex while reading in all conditions. Although it did not enable them to perform similarly to younger participants in all conditions, this over-activation could be interpreted as a compensation mechanism.

Narrative Discourse in Young and Older Adults: Behavioral and NIRS Analyses

PubMed Central

Martin, Charles-Olivier; Pontbriand-Drolet, Stéphanie; Daoust, Valérie; Yamga, Eric; Amiri, Mahnoush; Hübner, Lilian C.; Ska, Bernadette

2018-01-01

Discourse comprehension is at the core of communication capabilities, making it an important component of elderly populations’ quality of life. The aim of this study is to evaluate changes in discourse comprehension and the underlying brain activity. Thirty-six participants read short stories and answered related probes in three conditions: micropropositions, macropropositions and situation models. Using near-infrared spectroscopy (NIRS), the variation in oxyhemoglobin (HbO2) and deoxyhemoglobin (HbR) concentrations was assessed throughout the task. The results revealed that the older adults performed with equivalent accuracy to the young ones at the macroproposition level of discourse comprehension, but were less accurate at the microproposition and situation model levels. Similar to what is described in the compensation-related utilization of neural circuits hypothesis (CRUNCH) model, older participants tended to have greater activation in the left dorsolateral prefrontal cortex while reading in all conditions. Although it did not enable them to perform similarly to younger participants in all conditions, this over-activation could be interpreted as a compensation mechanism. PMID:29615892

Sensory and motoric influences on attention dynamics during standing balance recovery in young and older adults.

PubMed

Redfern, Mark S; Chambers, April J; Jennings, J Richard; Furman, Joseph M

2017-08-01

This study investigated the impact of attention on the sensory and motor actions during postural recovery from underfoot perturbations in young and older adults. A dual-task paradigm was used involving disjunctive and choice reaction time (RT) tasks to auditory and visual stimuli at different delays from the onset of two types of platform perturbations (rotations and translations). The RTs were increased prior to the perturbation (preparation phase) and during the immediate recovery response (response initiation) in young and older adults, but this interference dissipated rapidly after the perturbation response was initiated (<220 ms). The sensory modality of the RT task impacted the results with interference being greater for the auditory task compared to the visual task. As motor complexity of the RT task increased (disjunctive versus choice) there was greater interference from the perturbation. Finally, increasing the complexity of the postural perturbation by mixing the rotational and translational perturbations together increased interference for the auditory RT tasks, but did not affect the visual RT responses. These results suggest that sensory and motoric components of postural control are under the influence of different dynamic attentional processes.

Gender differences in nigrostriatal dopaminergic innervation are present at young-to-middle but not at older age in normal adults.

PubMed

Wong, Ka Kit; Müller, Martijn L T M; Kuwabara, Hiroto; Studenski, Stephanie A; Bohnen, Nicolaas I

2012-01-01

Gender differences in brain dopaminergic activity have been variably reported in the literature. We performed an evaluation for gender effects on striatal dopamine transporter (DAT) binding in a group of normal subjects. Community-dwelling adults (n = 85, 50F/35M, mean age 62.7 ± 16.2 SD, range 20-85) underwent DAT [(11)C]2-β-carbomethoxy-3β-(4-fluorophenyl) tropane (β-CFT) positron emission tomography (PET) imaging. Gender effects for DAT binding were compared using ANCOVA for two subgroups; young-to-middle aged adults and older adults, using an age threshold of 60 years. There were 54 subjects (24M/30F; mean age 72.9 ± 7.3) 60 years and older and 31 (11M/20F; mean age 45.0 ± 11.4) subjects younger than 60. Age-adjusted striatal DAT gender effects were present in the young-to-middle (F = 10.4, P = 0.003) but not in the elderly age group (F = 0.5, ns). Gender differences in nigrostriatal dopaminergic innervation are present, with higher levels of DAT binding in young-to-middle age women compared to men, but not present in the elderly. Published by Elsevier Ltd.

Similarities and differences between older and young adult patients with celiac disease.

PubMed

Kalkan, Çağdaş; Karakaya, Fatih; Soykan, Irfan

2017-11-01

Celiac disease is an autoimmune enteropathy with variable clinical symptoms. Elderly patients can have different manifestations from those of young patients. The aims of the present study were to investigate whether any differences or similarities exist between older and young patients with celiac disease with a special emphasis on concurrent autoimmune diseases. Celiac disease patients were stratified as older and younger patients. These two groups were then compared by means of clinical symptoms, laboratory parameters and concurrent autoimmune diseases. Factors associated with the presence of an autoimmune disease were identified by univariate and multivariate analysis. There were 66 older patients (mean age 67.7 ± 3.2 years, 50 women), and 277 younger patients (mean age 35.9 ± 11.7 years, 207 women). Of the 66 older patients, eight patients had gastrointestinal symptoms and 58 patients had extradigestive symptoms. In the younger group, the number of patients referred due to gastrointestinal symptoms was higher (8 [12.2%] vs 200 (72.2%), P < 0.001) compared with the older group. Whereas 10 (15.1%) older patients showed polyautoimmunity, 55 (19.8%) younger patients had polyautoimmunity. Multiple autoimmune syndrome was more common in older patients compared with young patients (31 [47%] vs 12 [4%], P < 0.001, respectively). The presentation of celiac disease clinically, histologically and by means of laboratory parameters is different in older and young patients. Polyautoimmunity and multiple autoimmune syndrome are more common in older patients compared with younger patients. A biopsy score of Marsh score type, antinuclear antibody positivity, high serum anti-tissue transglutaminase immunoglobulin A level and low hemoglobin level were risk factors for having an autoimmune disease. Geriatr Gerontol Int 2017; 17: 2060-2067. © 2017 Japan Geriatrics Society.

Assertiveness by Older Adults with Visual Impairment: Context Matters

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Ryan, Ellen Bouchard; Anas, Ann P.; Mays, Heather

2008-01-01

Within a communication predicament of aging and disability framework, this study examined the impact of two types of contextual variation on perceptions of older adult assertiveness within problematic service encounters. Young (N = 66) and older (N = 66) participants evaluated conversational scenarios in which a visually-impaired older woman…

Safety margins in older adults increase with improved control of a dynamic object

PubMed Central

Hasson, Christopher J.; Sternad, Dagmar

2014-01-01

Older adults face decreasing motor capabilities due to pervasive neuromuscular degradations. As a consequence, errors in movement control increase. Thus, older individuals should maintain larger safety margins than younger adults. While this has been shown for object manipulation tasks, several reports on whole-body activities, such as posture and locomotion, demonstrate age-related reductions in safety margins. This is despite increased costs for control errors, such as a fall. We posit that this paradox could be explained by the dynamic challenge presented by the body or also an external object, and that age-related reductions in safety margins are in part due to a decreased ability to control dynamics. To test this conjecture we used a virtual ball-in-cup task that had challenging dynamics, yet afforded an explicit rendering of the physics and safety margin. The hypotheses were: (1) When manipulating an object with challenging dynamics, older adults have smaller safety margins than younger adults. (2) Older adults increase their safety margins with practice. Nine young and 10 healthy older adults practiced moving the virtual ball-in-cup to a target location in exactly 2 s. The accuracy and precision of the timing error quantified skill, and the ball energy relative to an escape threshold quantified the safety margin. Compared to the young adults, older adults had increased timing errors, greater variability, and decreased safety margins. With practice, both young and older adults improved their ability to control the object with decreased timing errors and variability, and increased their safety margins. These results suggest that safety margins are related to the ability to control dynamics, and may explain why in tasks with simple dynamics older adults use adequate safety margins, but in more complex tasks, safety margins may be inadequate. Further, the results indicate that task-specific training may improve safety margins in older adults. PMID:25071566

Living Arrangements and Health of Older Adults in India.

PubMed

Samanta, Tannistha; Chen, Feinian; Vanneman, Reeve

2015-11-01

We investigate the association between the multigenerational household context and health of older adults in India, taking into account potential selection effects. Using data from the India Human Development Survey (2004-05), a nationally representative multitopic data set, we employed a two-step analytical strategy--logistic regression followed by propensity score stratification method--to model the effect of contrasting living arrangement types on short-term illness. Overall, older adults living in multigenerational households have the lowest levels of short-term illness. Among them, those who live with their spouse, adult children, and young grandchildren experience the highest health gains. Health advantage diminishes when older adults live only with a spouse and adult children, and further diminishes when they live only with their spouse. Solitary living is associated with the highest likelihood of short-term morbidity. Good health is also shown to be associated with household wealth, gender, household size, and urban residence. Our study demonstrates that multigenerational households--the traditional and the most dominant form of living arrangement in India--have protective health benefits for older adults, while taking into account potential selection mechanisms. On Contrary to some epidemiological studies, we do not find any elevated risk of exposure to short-term illness, when older adults are living in households with young grandchildren. © The Author 2014. Published by Oxford University Press on behalf of The Gerontological Society of America. All rights reserved. For permissions, please e-mail: journals.permissions@oup.com.

Age-Related Differences in Face Recognition: Neural Correlates of Repetition and Semantic Priming in Young and Older Adults

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Wiese, Holger; Komes, Jessica; Tüttenberg, Simone; Leidinger, Jana; Schweinberger, Stefan R.

2017-01-01

Difficulties in person recognition are among the common complaints associated with cognitive ageing. The present series of experiments therefore investigated face and person recognition in young and older adults. The authors examined how within-domain and cross-domain repetition as well as semantic priming affect familiar face recognition and…

Age differences in everyday problem-solving effectiveness: older adults select more effective strategies for interpersonal problems.

PubMed

Blanchard-Fields, Fredda; Mienaltowski, Andrew; Seay, Renee Baldi

2007-01-01

Using the Everyday Problem Solving Inventory of Cornelius and Caspi, we examined differences in problem-solving strategy endorsement and effectiveness in two domains of everyday functioning (instrumental or interpersonal, and a mixture of the two domains) and for four strategies (avoidance-denial, passive dependence, planful problem solving, and cognitive analysis). Consistent with past research, our research showed that older adults were more problem focused than young adults in their approach to solving instrumental problems, whereas older adults selected more avoidant-denial strategies than young adults when solving interpersonal problems. Overall, older adults were also more effective than young adults when solving everyday problems, in particular for interpersonal problems.

Anodal Transcranial Direct Current Stimulation Shows Minimal, Measure-Specific Effects on Dynamic Postural Control in Young and Older Adults: A Double Blind, Sham-Controlled Study.

PubMed

Craig, Chesney E; Doumas, Michail

2017-01-01

We investigated whether stimulating the cerebellum and primary motor cortex (M1) using transcranial direct current stimulation (tDCS) could affect postural control in young and older adults. tDCS was employed using a double-blind, sham-controlled design, in which young (aged 18-35) and older adults (aged 65+) were assessed over three sessions, one for each stimulatory condition-M1, cerebellar and sham. The effect of tDCS on postural control was assessed using a sway-referencing paradigm, which induced platform rotations in proportion to the participant's body sway, thus assessing sensory reweighting processes. Task difficulty was manipulated so that young adults experienced a support surface that was twice as compliant as that of older adults, in order to minimise baseline age differences in postural sway. Effects of tDCS on postural control were assessed during, immediately after and 30 minutes after tDCS. Additionally, the effect of tDCS on corticospinal excitability was measured by evaluating motor evoked potentials using transcranial magnetic stimulation immediately after and 30 minutes after tDCS. Minimal effects of tDCS on postural control were found in the eyes open condition only, and this was dependent on the measure assessed and age group. For young adults, stimulation had only offline effects, as cerebellar stimulation showed higher mean power frequency (MPF) of sway 30 minutes after stimulation. For older adults, both stimulation conditions delayed the increase in sway amplitude witnessed between blocks one and two until stimulation was no longer active. In conclusion, despite tDCS' growing popularity, we would caution researchers to consider carefully the type of measures assessed and the groups targeted in tDCS studies of postural control.

Psychiatric Co-Occurring Symptoms and Disorders in Young, Middle-Aged, and Older Adults with Autism Spectrum Disorder

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Lever, Anne G.; Geurts, Hilde M.

2016-01-01

Although psychiatric problems are less prevalent in old age within the general population, it is largely unknown whether this extends to individuals with autism spectrum disorders (ASD). We examined psychiatric symptoms and disorders in young, middle-aged, and older adults with and without ASD (N[subscript max] = 344, age 19-79 years, IQ > 80).…

Metachronous colon polyps in younger versus older adults: a case-control study.

PubMed

Nagpal, Sajan Jiv Singh; Mukhija, Dhruvika; Sanaka, Madhusudhan; Lopez, Rocio; Burke, Carol A

2018-03-01

The incidence of colorectal cancer in the United States has decreased substantially in individuals aged 50 and older. In contrast, it is increasing in young adults. The polyp characteristics on baseline and follow-up colonoscopy in young adults are not well characterized. We describe the polyp characteristics on baseline and follow-up colonoscopy in adults <40 years and determined factors associated with the occurrence of metachronous, advanced neoplasia or high-risk (HR) polyp features. We compared the occurrence of metachronous advanced neoplasia in young adults with those 50 years and older to assess whether postpolypectomy surveillance guidelines seem appropriate for polyp-bearing adults less than age 40 years. Patients <40 years of age with >1 polyp removed on colonoscopy followed by a postpolypectomy colonoscopy were eligible. The primary outcome was the occurrence of advanced neoplasia or HR polyp features on follow-up colonoscopy. Secondary endpoints included factors associated with metachronous advanced neoplasia in young adults. The occurrence of metachronous advanced neoplasia in young adults was compared with a cohort of patients aged 50 years and older. Included were 128 patients with a mean age of 34.9 years; 124 patients (97%) had adenomas and 7% had sessile serrated polyps (SSPs). Advanced neoplasia was seen in 35% of patients at baseline. The median follow-up time was 33.6 months. Metachronous advanced neoplasia was identified in 7% of patients on follow-up colonoscopy. Baseline factors associated with metachronous advanced neoplasia included the presence of an SSP (hazard ratio, 7.8; 95% CI, 1.09-56.3; P = .041) with a trend in those with advanced neoplasia (hazard ratio, 3.4; 95% confidence interval, .89-12.8; P = .072). The occurrence of metachronous advanced neoplasia did not differ between the young and older cohorts (7% vs 12.2%, P = .58); however, young adults were less likely to have HR polyp features on follow-up (8.6% vs 20.3%, P�

Acute dietary nitrate supplementation enhances compensatory vasodilation during hypoxic exercise in older adults.

PubMed

Casey, Darren P; Treichler, David P; Ganger, Charles T; Schneider, Aaron C; Ueda, Kenichi

2015-01-15

We have previously demonstrated that aging reduces the compensatory vasodilator response during hypoxic exercise due to blunted nitric oxide (NO) signaling. Recent evidence suggests that NO bioavailability can be augmented by dietary nitrate through the nitrate-nitrite pathway. Thus we tested the hypothesis that acute dietary nitrate supplementation increases the compensatory vasodilator response to hypoxic exercise, particularly in older adults. Thirteen young (25 ± 1 yr) and 12 older (64 ± 2 yr) adults performed rhythmic forearm exercise at 20% of maximum voluntary contraction during normoxia and hypoxia (∼80% O2 saturation); both before (control) and 3 h after beetroot juice (BR) consumption. Forearm vascular conductance (FVC; ml·min(-1)·100 mmHg(-1)) was calculated from forearm blood flow (ml/min) and blood pressure (mmHg). Compensatory vasodilation was defined as the relative increase in FVC due to hypoxic exercise (i.e., % increase compared with respective normoxic exercise trial). Plasma nitrite was determined from venous blood samples obtained before the control trials and each of the exercise trials (normoxia and hypoxia) after BR. Consumption of BR increased plasma nitrite in both young and older adults (P < 0.001). During the control condition, the compensatory vasodilator response to hypoxic exercise was attenuated in older compared with young adults (3.8 ± 1.7% vs. 14.2 ± 1.2%, P < 0.001). Following BR consumption, compensatory vasodilation did not change in young (13.7 ± 3.3%, P = 0.81) adults but was substantially augmented in older adults (11.4 ± 2.1%, P < 0.01). Our data suggest that acute dietary nitrate supplementation increases the compensatory vasodilator response to hypoxic exercise in older but not young adults. Copyright © 2015 the American Physiological Society.

Function in context: why American and Trinidadian young and older adults remember the personal past.

PubMed

Alea, Nicole; Bluck, Susan; Ali, Sideeka

2015-01-01

Multiple and interacting contextual (culture, life phase) and person-specific predictors (i.e., personality, tendency to think-talk about the past) of the functions of autobiographical memory were examined using the Thinking about Life Experiences Scale. American (N = 174) and Trinidadian (N = 182) young and older adults self-reported how frequently they remembered the personal past to serve self, social and directive functions, how often they thought and talked about their past overall, and completed a measure of trait personality. Independent contextual and person-specific predictors were found for using memory to serve a social-bonding function: Americans, young adults, those higher in extraversion, lower in conscientiousness and individuals who frequently think and talk about the past more often use autobiographical memory for social bonding. Across cultures, younger adults report more frequently using memory to serve all three functions, whereas Trinidadians who think more often about the past compared with those who reflect less often are more likely to use it for self and directive functions. Findings are discussed in terms of the individual's embeddedness in cultural and life phase contexts when remembering.

The effect of interference on temporal order memory for random and fixed sequences in nondemented older adults.

PubMed

Tolentino, Jerlyn C; Pirogovsky, Eva; Luu, Trinh; Toner, Chelsea K; Gilbert, Paul E

2012-05-21

Two experiments tested the effect of temporal interference on order memory for fixed and random sequences in young adults and nondemented older adults. The results demonstrate that temporal order memory for fixed and random sequences is impaired in nondemented older adults, particularly when temporal interference is high. However, temporal order memory for fixed sequences is comparable between older adults and young adults when temporal interference is minimized. The results suggest that temporal order memory is less efficient and more susceptible to interference in older adults, possibly due to impaired temporal pattern separation.

Reducing misinformation effects in older adults with cognitive interview mnemonics.

PubMed

Holliday, Robyn E; Humphries, Joyce E; Milne, Rebecca; Memon, Amina; Houlder, Lucy; Lyons, Amy; Bull, Ray

2012-12-01

We examined the effect of a prior Modified Cognitive Interview on young and older adults' recall of a short film of a staged crime and subsequent reporting of misinformation. Participants viewed the film followed the next day by misinformation presented in a postevent summary. They were then interviewed with either a Modified Cognitive Interview or a control interview followed by a recognition memory test. A Modified Cognitive Interview elicited more correct details and improved overall accuracy compared to a control interview in both age groups, although the young adults recollected three times more correct information in a Modified Cognitive Interview than the older adults. In both age groups, correct recollections of person and action details were higher in a Modified Cognitive Interview than a control interview. Importantly, older adults who were interviewed with a Modified Cognitive Interview were not susceptible to misinformation effects. 2013 APA, all rights reserved

Social Relevance Enhances Memory for Impressions in Older Adults

PubMed Central

Cassidy, Brittany S.; Gutchess, Angela H.

2012-01-01

Previous research has demonstrated that older adults have difficulty retrieving contextual material over items alone. Recent research suggests this deficit can be reduced by adding emotional context, allowing for the possibility that memory for social impressions may show less age-related decline than memory for other types of contextual information. Two studies investigated how orienting to social or self-relevant aspects of information contributed to the learning and retrieval of impressions in young and older adults. Participants encoded impressions of others in conditions varying in the use of self-reference (Experiment 1) and interpersonal meaningfulness (Experiment 2), and completed memory tasks requiring the retrieval of specific traits. For both experiments, age groups remembered similar numbers of impressions. In Experiment 1, using more self-relevant encoding contexts increased memory for impressions over orienting to stimuli in a non-social way, regardless of age. In Experiment 2, older adults had enhanced memory for impressions presented in an interpersonally meaningful relative to a personally irrelevant way, whereas young adults were unaffected by this manipulation. The results provide evidence that increasing social relevance ameliorates age differences in memory for impressions, and enhances older adults’ ability to successfully retrieve contextual information. PMID:22364168

Task difficulty has no effect on haptic anchoring during tandem walking in young and older adults.

PubMed

Costa, Andréia Abud da Silva; Santos, Luciana Oliveira Dos; Mauerberg-deCastro, Eliane; Moraes, Renato

2018-02-14

This study assessed the contribution of the "anchor system's" haptic information to balance control during walking at two levels of difficulty. Seventeen young adults and seventeen older adults performed 20 randomized trials of tandem walking in a straight line, on level ground and on a slightly-raised balance beam, both with and without the use of the anchors. The anchor consists of two flexible cables, whose ends participants hold in each hand, to which weights (125 g) are attached at the opposing ends, and which rest on the ground. As the participants walk, they pull on the cables, dragging the anchors. Spatiotemporal gait variables (step speed and single- and double-support duration) were processed using retro-reflective markers on anatomical sites. An accelerometer positioned in the cervical region registered trunk acceleration. Walking on the balance beam increased single- and double-support duration and reduced step speed in older adults, which suggests that this condition was more difficult than walking on the level ground. The anchors reduced trunk acceleration in the frontal plane, but the level of difficulty of the walking task showed no effect. Thus, varying the difficulty of the task had no influence on the way in which participants used the anchor system while tandem walking. The older adults exhibited more difficulty in walking on the balance beam as compared to the younger adults; however, the effect of the anchor system was similar in both groups. Copyright © 2017 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.

Turn Off the Music! Music Impairs Visual Associative Memory Performance in Older Adults.

PubMed

Reaves, Sarah; Graham, Brittany; Grahn, Jessica; Rabannifard, Parissa; Duarte, Audrey

2016-06-01

Whether we are explicitly listening to it or not, music is prevalent in our environment. Surprisingly, little is known about the effect of environmental music on concurrent cognitive functioning and whether young and older adults are differentially affected by music. Here, we investigated the impact of background music on a concurrent paired associate learning task in healthy young and older adults. Young and older adults listened to music or to silence while simultaneously studying face-name pairs. Participants' memory for the pairs was then tested while listening to either the same or different music. Participants also made subjective ratings about how distracting they found each song to be. Despite the fact that all participants rated music as more distracting to their performance than silence, only older adults' associative memory performance was impaired by music. These results are most consistent with the theory that older adults' failure to inhibit processing of distracting task-irrelevant information, in this case background music, contributes to their memory impairments. These data have important practical implications for older adults' ability to perform cognitively demanding tasks even in what many consider to be an unobtrusive environment. © The Author 2015. Published by Oxford University Press on behalf of The Gerontological Society of America. All rights reserved. For permissions, please e-mail: journals.permissions@oup.com.

Representational momentum in older adults.

PubMed

Piotrowski, Andrea S; Jakobson, Lorna S

2011-10-01

Humans have a tendency to perceive motion even in static images that simply "imply" movement. This tendency is so strong that our memory for actions depicted in static images is distorted in the direction of implied motion - a phenomenon known as representational momentum (RM). In the present study, we created an RM display depicting a pattern of implied (clockwise) rotation of a rectangle. Young adults viewers' memory of the final position of the test rectangle was biased in the direction of continuing rotation, but older adults did not show a similar memory bias. We discuss several possible explanations for this group difference, but argue that the failure of older adults to shown an RM effect most likely reflects age-related changes in areas of the brain involved in processing real and implied motion. Copyright © 2011 Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.

Older adults adopted more cautious gait patterns when walking in socks than barefoot.

PubMed

Tsai, Yi-Ju; Lin, Sang-I

2013-01-01

Walking barefoot or in socks is common for ambulating indoors and has been reported to be associated with increased risk of falls and related injuries in the elderly. This study sought to determine if gait patterns differed between these two conditions for young and older adults. A motion analysis system was used to record and calculate the stride characteristics and motion of the body's center of mass (COM) of 21 young and 20 older adults. For the walking tasks, the participants walked on a smooth floor surface at their preferred speed either barefoot or in socks in a random order. The socks were commercially available and commonly used. The results demonstrated that while walking in socks, compared with walking barefoot, older adults adopted a more cautious gait pattern including decreased walking speed and shortened stride length as well as reduced COM minimal velocity during the single limb support phase. Young adults, however, did not demonstrate significant changes. These findings suggest that walking with socks might present a greater balance threat for older adults. Clinically, safety precautions about walking in socks should be considered to be given to older adults, especially those with balance deficits. Copyright © 2012 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.

Anodal Transcranial Direct Current Stimulation Shows Minimal, Measure-Specific Effects on Dynamic Postural Control in Young and Older Adults: A Double Blind, Sham-Controlled Study

PubMed Central

Doumas, Michail

2017-01-01

We investigated whether stimulating the cerebellum and primary motor cortex (M1) using transcranial direct current stimulation (tDCS) could affect postural control in young and older adults. tDCS was employed using a double-blind, sham-controlled design, in which young (aged 18–35) and older adults (aged 65+) were assessed over three sessions, one for each stimulatory condition–M1, cerebellar and sham. The effect of tDCS on postural control was assessed using a sway-referencing paradigm, which induced platform rotations in proportion to the participant’s body sway, thus assessing sensory reweighting processes. Task difficulty was manipulated so that young adults experienced a support surface that was twice as compliant as that of older adults, in order to minimise baseline age differences in postural sway. Effects of tDCS on postural control were assessed during, immediately after and 30 minutes after tDCS. Additionally, the effect of tDCS on corticospinal excitability was measured by evaluating motor evoked potentials using transcranial magnetic stimulation immediately after and 30 minutes after tDCS. Minimal effects of tDCS on postural control were found in the eyes open condition only, and this was dependent on the measure assessed and age group. For young adults, stimulation had only offline effects, as cerebellar stimulation showed higher mean power frequency (MPF) of sway 30 minutes after stimulation. For older adults, both stimulation conditions delayed the increase in sway amplitude witnessed between blocks one and two until stimulation was no longer active. In conclusion, despite tDCS’ growing popularity, we would caution researchers to consider carefully the type of measures assessed and the groups targeted in tDCS studies of postural control. PMID:28099522

Validation of the ADAMO Care Watch for step counting in older adults.

PubMed

Magistro, Daniele; Brustio, Paolo Riccardo; Ivaldi, Marco; Esliger, Dale Winfield; Zecca, Massimiliano; Rainoldi, Alberto; Boccia, Gennaro

2018-01-01

Accurate measurement devices are required to objectively quantify physical activity. Wearable activity monitors, such as pedometers, may serve as affordable and feasible instruments for measuring physical activity levels in older adults during their normal activities of daily living. Currently few available accelerometer-based steps counting devices have been shown to be accurate at slow walking speeds, therefore there is still lacking appropriate devices tailored for slow speed ambulation, typical of older adults. This study aimed to assess the validity of step counting using the pedometer function of the ADAMO Care Watch, containing an embedded algorithm for measuring physical activity in older adults. Twenty older adults aged ≥ 65 years (mean ± SD, 75±7 years; range, 68-91) and 20 young adults (25±5 years, range 20-40), wore a care watch on each wrist and performed a number of randomly ordered tasks: walking at slow, normal and fast self-paced speeds; a Timed Up and Go test (TUG); a step test and ascending/descending stairs. The criterion measure was the actual number of steps observed, counted with a manual tally counter. Absolute percentage error scores, Intraclass Correlation Coefficients (ICC), and Bland-Altman plots were used to assess validity. ADAMO Care Watch demonstrated high validity during slow and normal speeds (range 0.5-1.5 m/s) showing an absolute error from 1.3% to 1.9% in the older adult group and from 0.7% to 2.7% in the young adult group. The percentage error for the 30-metre walking tasks increased with faster pace in both young adult (17%) and older adult groups (6%). In the TUG test, there was less error in the steps recorded for older adults (1.3% to 2.2%) than the young adults (6.6% to 7.2%). For the total sample, the ICCs for the ADAMO Care Watch for the 30-metre walking tasks at each speed and for the TUG test were ranged between 0.931 to 0.985. These findings provide evidence that the ADAMO Care Watch demonstrated highly accurate

Quantification of biological aging in young adults

PubMed Central

Belsky, Daniel W.; Caspi, Avshalom; Houts, Renate; Cohen, Harvey J.; Corcoran, David L.; Danese, Andrea; Harrington, HonaLee; Israel, Salomon; Levine, Morgan E.; Schaefer, Jonathan D.; Sugden, Karen; Williams, Ben; Yashin, Anatoli I.; Poulton, Richie; Moffitt, Terrie E.

2015-01-01

Antiaging therapies show promise in model organism research. Translation to humans is needed to address the challenges of an aging global population. Interventions to slow human aging will need to be applied to still-young individuals. However, most human aging research examines older adults, many with chronic disease. As a result, little is known about aging in young humans. We studied aging in 954 young humans, the Dunedin Study birth cohort, tracking multiple biomarkers across three time points spanning their third and fourth decades of life. We developed and validated two methods by which aging can be measured in young adults, one cross-sectional and one longitudinal. Our longitudinal measure allows quantification of the pace of coordinated physiological deterioration across multiple organ systems (e.g., pulmonary, periodontal, cardiovascular, renal, hepatic, and immune function). We applied these methods to assess biological aging in young humans who had not yet developed age-related diseases. Young individuals of the same chronological age varied in their “biological aging” (declining integrity of multiple organ systems). Already, before midlife, individuals who were aging more rapidly were less physically able, showed cognitive decline and brain aging, self-reported worse health, and looked older. Measured biological aging in young adults can be used to identify causes of aging and evaluate rejuvenation therapies. PMID:26150497

Collaborative remembering in older adults: age-invariant outcomes in the context of episodic recall deficits.

PubMed

Henkel, Linda A; Rajaram, Suparna

2011-09-01

Rapidly growing research reveals complex yet systematic consequences of collaboration on memory in young adults, but much less is known about this phenomenon in older adults. Young and older adults studied a list of categorized words and took three successive recall tests. Test 1 and 3 were always taken individually, and Test 2 was done either in triads or alone. Despite older adults recalling less overall than young adults, both age groups exhibited similar costs and benefits of collaboration: Collaboration reduced both correct and false recall during collaborative remembering, was associated with more positive beliefs about its value, and produced reminiscence, collective memory, and some forgetting in its cascading effects on postcollaborative recall. We examine the role of retrieval organization in these effects. As environmental support may play a substantial role in healthy aging, the relatively preserved effects of collaboration on memory in older adults hold promise for testing judicious uses of group remembering in aging.

Comparable Rest-related Promotion of Spatial Memory Consolidation in Younger and Older Adults

PubMed Central

Craig, Michael; Wolbers, Thomas; Harris, Mathew A.; Hauff, Patrick; Della Sala, Sergio; Dewar, Michaela

2017-01-01

Flexible spatial navigation depends on cognitive mapping, a function that declines with increasing age. In young adults, a brief period of post-navigation rest promotes the consolidation/integration of spatial memories into accurate cognitive maps. We examined (1) whether rest promotes spatial memory consolidation/integration in older adults and (2) whether the magnitude of the rest benefit changes with increasing age. Young and older adults learned a route through a virtual environment, followed by a 10min delay comprising either wakeful rest or a perceptual task, and a subsequent cognitive mapping task, requiring the pointing to landmarks from different locations. Pointing accuracy was lower in the older than younger adults. However, there was a comparable rest-related enhancement in pointing accuracy in the two age groups. Together our findings suggest that (i) the age-related decline in cognitive mapping cannot be explained by increased consolidation interference in older adults, and (ii) as we grow older rest continues to support the consolidation/integration of spatial memories. PMID:27689512

Postsecondary Employment Experiences Among Young Adults With an Autism Spectrum Disorder RH: Employment in Young Adults With Autism

PubMed Central

Roux, Anne M.; Shattuck, Paul T.; Cooper, Benjamin P.; Anderson, Kristy A.; Wagner, Mary; Narendorf, Sarah C.

2013-01-01

Objective We examined postsecondary employment experiences of young adults with an autism spectrum disorder (ASD) and compared these outcomes with those of young adults with different disabilities. Method Data were from Wave 5 of the National Longitudinal Transition Study 2 (NLTS2), a nationally representative survey of young adults who had received special education services during high school. We examined the prevalence of ever having had—and currently having—a paid job at 21–25 years of age. We analyzed rates of full employment, wages earned, number of jobs held since high school, and job types. Results About half (53.4%) of young adults with an ASD had ever worked for pay outside the home since leaving high school, the lowest rate among disability groups. Young adults with an ASD earned an average of $8.10 per hour, significantly lower than average wages for young adults in the comparison groups, and held jobs that clustered within fewer occupational types. Odds of ever having had a paid job were higher for those who were older, from higher-income households, and with better conversational abilities or functional skills. Conclusions Findings of worse employment outcomes for young adults with an ASD suggest this population is experiencing particular difficulty in successfully transitioning into employment. Research is needed to determine strategies for improving outcomes as these young adults transition into adulthood. PMID:23972695

Age-Group Differences in Interference from Young and Older Emotional Faces.

PubMed

Ebner, Natalie C; Johnson, Marcia K

2010-11-01

Human attention is selective, focusing on some aspects of events at the expense of others. In particular, angry faces engage attention. Most studies have used pictures of young faces, even when comparing young and older age groups. Two experiments asked (1) whether task-irrelevant faces of young and older individuals with happy, angry, and neutral expressions disrupt performance on a face-unrelated task, (2) whether interference varies for faces of different ages and different facial expressions, and (3) whether young and older adults differ in this regard. Participants gave speeded responses on a number task while irrelevant faces appeared in the background. Both age groups were more distracted by own than other-age faces. In addition, young participants' responses were slower for angry than happy faces, whereas older participants' responses were slower for happy than angry faces. Factors underlying age-group differences in interference from emotional faces of different ages are discussed.

Compensatory but not anticipatory adjustments are altered in older adults during lateral postural perturbations.

PubMed

Claudino, Renato; dos Santos, Eloá C C; Santos, Marcio J

2013-08-01

This study investigated anticipatory postural adjustments (APAs) and compensatory postural adjustments (CPAs) and their relationship in older adults during lateral postural perturbations. Unpredictable and predictable postural disturbances were induced by a swinging pendulum that impacted at the shoulder level of two groups of older adults, non-fallers (20) and fallers (20), and in a group of young control subjects (20). The electromyographic (EMG) activity of the postural muscles and the center of pressure (COP) displacement were recorded and quantified within the time intervals typical for APAs and CPAs. Both groups of older adults (non-fallers and fallers) showed higher magnitude of EMG activity in the lateral muscles and increased COP displacement, particularly, during the CPAs time interval when compared to the young group. Older adults, however, were able to change the electrical activity of the muscles during the predictable task by generating APAs with similar magnitudes of those found in young subjects. Compensatory but not anticipatory adjustments are altered in older adults during predictable lateral postural perturbations. These findings provide new data on the role of APAs and CPAs in their relationship in older adults during external lateral perturbations and may advance current rehabilitative management strategies to improve balance control in older individuals. Copyright © 2013 International Federation of Clinical Neurophysiology. Published by Elsevier Ireland Ltd. All rights reserved.

Older adults utilize less efficient postural control when performing pushing task

PubMed Central

Lee, Yun-Ju; Chen, Bing; Aruin, Alexander S.

2015-01-01

The ability to maintain balance deteriorates with increasing age. The aim was to investigate the role of age in generation of anticipatory (APA) and compensatory (CPA) postural adjustments during pushing an object. Older (68.8 ± 1.0 years) and young adults (30.1 ± 1.4 years) participated in the experiment involving pushing an object (a pendulum attached to the ceiling) using both hands. Electrical activity of six leg and trunk muscles and displacements of the center of pressure (COP) were recorded and analyzed during the APA and CPA phases. The onset time, integrals of muscle activity, and COP displacements were determined. In addition, the indexes of co-activation and reciprocal activation of muscles for the shank, thigh, and trunk segments were calculated. Older adults, compared to young adults, showed less efficient postural control seen as delayed anticipatory muscle onset times and delayed COP displacements. Moreover, older adults used co-activation of muscles during the CPA phase while younger subjects utilized reciprocal activation of muscles. The observed diminished efficiency of postural control during both anticipatory and compensatory postural adjustments observed in older adults might predispose them to falls while performing tasks involving pushing. The outcome provides a background for future studies focused on the optimization of the daily activities of older adults. PMID:26403099

Effect of transcutaneous electrical stimulation amplitude on timing of swallow pressure peaks between healthy young and older adults.

PubMed

Barikroo, Ali; Berretin-Felix, Giedré; Carnaby, Giselle; Crary, Michael

2017-03-01

This study compared the effect of transcutaneous electrical stimulation (TES) amplitude on timing of lingual-palatal and pharyngeal peak pressures during swallowing in healthy younger and older adults. Transcutaneous electrical stimulation amplitude is one parameter that may have different impacts on the neuromotor system and swallowing physiology. One aspect of swallowing physiology influenced by age is the timing of swallowing events. However, the effect of varying TES amplitudes on timing of swallowing physiology is poorly understood, especially in older adults. Thirty-four adults (20 younger and 14 older) swallowed 10 ml of nectar-thick liquid under three TES conditions: no stimulation, low-amplitude stimulation and high-amplitude stimulation. TES was delivered by surface electrodes on the anterior neck. Timing of pressure peaks for lingual-palatal contacts and pharyngeal pressures were measured under each condition. A significant age × stimulation amplitude interaction was identified for the base of tongue (BOT) [F(2,62) = 5.087, p < 0.009] and the hypopharynx (HYPO) [F(2,62) = 3.277, p < 0.044]. At the BOT, low-amplitude TES resulted in slower swallows in the younger adults compared with no TES. In older adults, low-amplitude TES resulted in faster swallows compared with high-amplitude TES. At the HYPO, no significant differences were identified in pressure timing across the three TES amplitudes in both age groups. In each case, low-amplitude TES resulted in faster swallows in older adults compared with younger adults. Transcutaneous electrical stimulation influences pharyngeal pressure timing differently in young and old people, which questions the appropriateness of using a 'one-size-fits-all' TES amplitude for rehabilitating people with dysphagia. © 2015 John Wiley & Sons A/S and The Gerodontology Association. Published by John Wiley & Sons Ltd.

Treatment of Young Adults with Acute Lymphoblastic Leukemia.

PubMed

Kansagra, Ankit; Litzow, Mark

2017-06-01

Young adults with acute lymphoblastic leukemia are a distinctive category of patients, with substantial difference in disease biology and response to therapy; hence, they pose unique challenges and issues beyond those faced by children and older adults. Despite inferior survival compared to children, there is growing evidence to suggest that young adults have improved outcomes when treated with pediatric-based approaches. With better supportive care and toxicity management and multidisciplinary team and approach, we have made great improvement in outcomes of young adults with ALL. However, despite significant progress, patients with persistence of minimal residual disease have a poor prognosis. This review discusses current controversies in the management of young adults with ALL, outcomes following pediatric and adult protocols, and the role of allogeneic stem cell transplantation. We also explore recent advances in disease monitoring and highlight our approach to incorporation of novel therapies in the management of young adults with ALL.

Are age-related differences between young and older adults in an affective working memory test sensitive to the music effects?

PubMed

Borella, Erika; Carretti, Barbara; Grassi, Massimo; Nucci, Massimo; Sciore, Roberta

2014-01-01

There are evidences showing that music can affect cognitive performance by improving our emotional state. The aim of the current study was to analyze whether age-related differences between young and older adults in a Working Memory (WM) Span test in which the stimuli to be recalled have a different valence (i.e., neutral, positive, or negative words), are sensitive to exposure to music. Because some previous studies showed that emotional words can sustain older adults' performance in WM, we examined whether listening to music could enhance the benefit of emotional material, with respect to neutral words, on WM performance decreasing the age-related difference between younger and older adults. In particular, the effect of two types of music (Mozart vs. Albinoni), which differ in tempo, arousal and mood induction, on age-related differences in an affective version of the Operation WM Span task was analyzed. Results showed no effect of music on the WM test regardless of the emotional content of the music (Mozart vs. Albinoni). However, a valence effect for the words in the WM task was found with a higher number of negative words recalled with respect to positive and neutral ones in both younger and older adults. When individual differences in terms of accuracy in the processing phase of the Operation Span task were considered, only younger low-performing participants were affected by the type music, with the Albinoni condition that lowered their performance with respect to the Mozart condition. Such a result suggests that individual differences in WM performance, at least when young adults are considered, could be affected by the type of music. Altogether, these findings suggest that complex span tasks, such as WM tasks, along with age-related differences are not sensitive to music effects.

Not just scenery: viewing nature pictures improves executive attention in older adults.

PubMed

Gamble, Katherine R; Howard, James H; Howard, Darlene V

2014-01-01

BACKGROUND/STUDY CONTEXT: Attention Restoration Theory (Kaplan, 1995, Journal of Environmental Psychology, 15, 169-182) suggests that exposure to nature improves attention. Berman, Jonides, and Kaplan (2008, Psychological Science, 19, 1207-1212) showed that simply viewing nature pictures improves executive attention in young adults. The present study is the first to investigate this Nature Effect in older adults. The authors investigated whether executive attention could be improved in healthy older adults following brief exposure to nature pictures. Thirty healthy older adults (64-79 years old) and 26 young university students (18-25 years old) participated. They completed the Attention Network Test before and after 6 min of viewing either nature or urban pictures, with random assignment into a picture type. Attention immediately before (most fatigued) and after (most restored) picture viewing was measured, and change in attention was compared between age groups and picture types. Results showed that viewing nature, but not urban, pictures significantly improved executive attention in both older and young adults as measured by the Attention Network Test, with similar effects seen in the two age groups. Alerting and orienting attention scores were not affected by picture viewing. This was the first study to show that viewing nature pictures improves attention in older adults, and to show that it is executive attention, specifically, that is improved. Among a growing number of interventions, nature exposure offers a quick, inexpensive, and enjoyable means to provide a temporary boost in executive attention.

Not just scenery: Viewing nature pictures improves executive attention in older adults

PubMed Central

Gamble, Katherine R.; Howard, James H.; Howard, Darlene V.

2016-01-01

Background/Study Context Attention Restoration Theory (Kaplan, 1995) suggests that exposure to nature improves attention. Berman, Jonides and Kaplan (2008) showed that simply viewing nature pictures improves executive attention in young adults. The present study is the first to investigate this Nature Effect in older adults. We investigated whether executive attention could be improved in healthy older adults following brief exposure to nature pictures. Methods Thirty healthy older adults (64–79 years old) and 26 young university students (18–25 years old) participated. They completed the Attention Network Test before and after six minutes of viewing either nature or urban pictures, with random assignment into a picture type. Attention immediately before (most fatigued) and after (most restored) picture viewing was measured, and change in attention was compared between age groups and picture types. Results Results showed that viewing nature, but not urban, pictures significantly improved executive attention in both older and young adults as measured by the Attention Network Test, with similar effects seen in the two age groups. Alerting and orienting attention scores were not affected by picture-viewing. Conclusion This was the first study to show that viewing nature pictures improves attention in older adults, and to show that it is executive attention, specifically, that is improved. Among a growing number of interventions, nature exposure offers a quick, inexpensive, and enjoyable means to provide a temporary boost in executive attention. PMID:25321942

Function in context: Why American and Trinidadian young and older adults remember the personal past

PubMed Central

Bluck, Susan; Ali, Sideeka

2014-01-01

Multiple and interacting contextual (culture, life phase) and person-specific predictors (i.e., personality, tendency to think-talk about the past) of the functions of autobiographical memory were examined using the Thinking about Life Experiences scale. American (N = 174) and Trinidadian (N = 182) young and older adults self-reported how frequently they remembered the personal past to serve self, social, and directive functions, how often they thought and talked about their past overall, and completed a measure of trait personality. Independent contextual and person-specific predictors were found for using memory to serve a social-bonding function: Americans, young adults, those higher in extraversion, lower in conscientiousness, and individuals who frequently think and talk about the past more often use autobiographical memory for social-bonding. Across cultures, younger adults report more frequently using memory to serve all three functions, whereas Trinidadians who think more often about the past compared with those who reflect less often, are more likely to use it for self and directive functions. Findings are discussed in terms of the individual’s embeddedness in cultural and life phase contexts when remembering. PMID:24992649

Relationship of metabolic and endocrine parameters to brain glucose metabolism in older adults: do cognitively-normal older adults have a particular metabolic phenotype?

PubMed

Nugent, S; Castellano, C A; Bocti, C; Dionne, I; Fulop, T; Cunnane, S C

2016-02-01

Our primary objective in this study was to quantify whole brain and regional cerebral metabolic rates of glucose (CMRg) in young and older adults in order to determine age-normalized reference CMRg values for healthy older adults with normal cognition for age. Our secondary objectives were to--(i) report a broader range of metabolic and endocrine parameters including body fat composition that could form the basis for the concept of a 'metabolic phenotype' in cognitively normal, older adults, and (ii) to assess whether medications commonly used to control blood lipids, blood pressure or thyroxine affect CMRg values in older adults. Cognition assessed by a battery of tests was normal for age and education in both groups. Compared to the young group (25 years old; n = 34), the older group (72 years old; n = 41) had ~14% lower CMRg (μmol/100 g/min) specifically in the frontal cortex, and 18% lower CMRg in the caudate. Lower grey matter volume and cortical thickness was widespread in the older group. These differences in CMRg, grey matter volume and cortical thickness were present in the absence of any known evidence for prodromal Alzheimer's disease (AD). Percent total body fat was positively correlated with CMRg in many brain regions but only in the older group. Before and after controlling for body fat, HOMA2-IR was significantly positively correlated to CMRg in several brain regions in the older group. These data show that compared to a healthy younger adult, the metabolic phenotype of a cognitively-normal 72 year old person includes similar plasma glucose, insulin, cholesterol, triglycerides and TSH, higher hemoglobin A1c and percent body fat, lower CMRg in the superior frontal cortex and caudate, but the same CMRg in the hippocampus and white matter. Age-normalization of cognitive test results is standard practice and we would suggest that regional CMRg in cognitively healthy older adults should also be age-normalized.

Influence of vision on head stabilization strategies in older adults during walking.

PubMed

Cromwell, Ronita L; Newton, Roberta A; Forrest, Gail

2002-07-01

Maintaining balance during dynamic activities is essential for preventing falls in older adults. Head stabilization contributes to dynamic balance, especially during the functional task of walking. Head stability and the role of vision in this process have not been studied during walking in older adults. Seventeen older adults (76.2 +/- 6.9 years) and 20 young adults (26.0 +/- 3.4 years) walked with their eyes open (EO), with their eyes closed (EC), and with fixed gaze (FG). Participants performed three trials of each condition. Sagittal plane head and trunk angular velocities in space were obtained using an infrared camera system with passive reflective markers. Frequency analyses of head-on-trunk with respect to trunk gains and phases were examined for head-trunk movement strategies used for head stability. Average walking velocity, cadence, and peak head velocity were calculated for each condition. Differences between age groups demonstrated that older adults decreased walking velocity in EO (p =.022). FG (p = .021), and EC (p = .022). and decreased cadence during EC (p = .007). Peak head velocity also decreased across conditions (p < .0001) for older adults. Movement patterns demonstrated increased head stability during EO. diminished head stability with EC, and improved head stability with FG as older adult patterns resembled those of young adults. Increased stability of the lower extremity outcome measures for older adults was indicated by reductions in walking velocity and cadence. Concomitant increases in head stability were related to visual tasks. Increased stability may serve as a protective mechanism to prevent falls. Further, vision facilitates the head stabilization process for older adults to compensate for age-related decrements in other sensory systems subserving dynamic balance.

Muscle activities used by young and old adults when stepping to regain balance during a forward fall.

PubMed

Thelen, D G; Muriuki, M; James, J; Schultz, A B; Ashton-Miller, J A; Alexander, N B

2000-04-01

The current study was undertaken to determine if age-related differences in muscle activities might relate to older adults being significantly less able than young adults to recover balance during a forward fall. Fourteen young and twelve older healthy males were released from forward leans of various magnitudes and asked to regain standing balance by taking a single forward step. Myoelectric signals were recorded from 12 lower extremity muscles and processed to compare the muscle activation patterns of young and older adults. Young adults successfully recovered from significantly larger leans than older adults using a single step (32.2 degrees vs. 23.5 degrees ). Muscular latency times, the time between release and activity onset, ranged from 73 to 114 ms with no significant age-related differences in the shortest muscular latency times. The overall response muscular activation patterns were similar for young and older adults. However older adults were slower to deactivate three stance leg muscles and also demonstrated delays in activating the step leg hip flexors and knee extensors prior to and during the swing phase. In the forward fall paradigm studied, age-differences in balance recovery performance do not seem due to slowness in response onset but may relate to differences in muscle activation timing during the stepping movement.

Trunk repositioning errors are increased in balance-impaired older adults.

PubMed

Goldberg, Allon; Hernandez, Manuel Enrique; Alexander, Neil B

2005-10-01

Controlling the flexing trunk is critical in recovering from a loss of balance and avoiding a fall. To investigate the relationship between trunk control and balance in older adults, we measured trunk repositioning accuracy in young and balance-impaired and unimpaired older adults. Young adults (N = 8, mean age 24.3 years) and two groups of community-dwelling older adults defined by unipedal stance time (UST)-a balance-unimpaired group (UST > 30 seconds, N = 7, mean age 73.9 years) and a balance-impaired group (UST < 5 seconds, N = 8, mean age 79.6 years)-were tested in standing trunk control ability by reproducing a approximately 30 degrees trunk flexion angle under three visual-surface conditions: eyes opened and closed on the floor, and eyes opened on foam. Errors in reproducing the angle were defined as trunk repositioning errors (TREs). Clinical measures related to balance, trunk extensor strength, and self-reported disability were obtained. TREs were significantly greater in the balance-impaired group than in the other groups, even when controlling for trunk extensor strength and body mass. In older adults, there were significant correlations between TREs and three clinical measures of balance and fall risk, UST and maximum step length (-0.65 to -0.75), and Timed Up & Go score (0.55), and between TREs and age (0.63-0.76). In each group TREs were similar under the three visual-surface conditions. Test-retest reliability for TREs was good to excellent (intraclass correlation coefficients > or =0.74). Older balance-impaired adults have larger TREs, and thus poorer trunk control, than do balance-unimpaired older individuals. TREs are reliable and valid measures of underlying balance impairment in older adults, and may eventually prove to be useful in predicting the ability to recover from losses of balance and to avoid falls.

Insufficient chunk concatenation may underlie changes in sleep-dependent consolidation of motor sequence learning in older adults.

PubMed

Bottary, Ryan; Sonni, Akshata; Wright, David; Spencer, Rebecca M C

2016-09-01

Sleep enhances motor sequence learning (MSL) in young adults by concatenating subsequences ("chunks") formed during skill acquisition. To examine whether this process is reduced in aging, we assessed performance changes on the MSL task following overnight sleep or daytime wake in healthy young and older adults. Young adult performance enhancement was correlated with nREM2 sleep, and facilitated by preferential improvement of slowest within-sequence transitions. This effect was markedly reduced in older adults, and accompanied by diminished sigma power density (12-15 Hz) during nREM2 sleep, suggesting that diminished chunk concatenation following sleep may underlie reduced consolidation of MSL in older adults. © 2016 Bottary et al.; Published by Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory Press.

Holistic processing and reliance on global viewing strategies in older adults' face perception.

PubMed

Meinhardt-Injac, Bozana; Persike, Malte; Meinhardt, Günter

2014-09-01

There is increasing evidence that face recognition might be impaired in older adults, but it is unclear whether the impairment is truly perceptual, and face specific. In order to address this question we compared performance in same/different matching tasks with face and non-face objects (watches) among young (mean age 23.7) and older adults (mean age 70.4) using a context congruency paradigm (Meinhardt-Injac, Persike & Meinhardt, 2010, Meinhardt-Injac, Persike and Meinhardt, 2011a). Older adults were less accurate than young adults with both object classes, while face matching was notably impaired. Effects of context congruency and inversion, measured as the hallmarks of holistic processing, were equally strong in both age groups, and were found only for faces, but not for watches. The face specific decline in older adults revealed deficits in handling internal facial features, while young adults matched external and internal features equally well. Comparison with non-face stimuli showed that this decline was face specific, and did not concern processing of object features in general. Taken together, the results indicate no age-related decline in the capabilities to process faces holistically. Rather, strong holistic effects, combined with a loss of precision in handling internal features indicate that older adults rely on global viewing strategies for faces. At the same time, access to the exact properties of inner face details becomes restricted. Copyright © 2014. Published by Elsevier B.V.

Young and Older Adults’ Beliefs about Effective Ways to Mitigate Age-Related Memory Decline

PubMed Central

Horhota, Michelle; Lineweaver, Tara; Ositelu, Monique; Summers, Kristi; Hertzog, Christopher

2013-01-01

This study investigated whether young and older adults vary in their beliefs about the impact of various mitigating factors on age-related memory decline. Eighty young (ages 18–23) and eighty older (ages 60–82) participants reported their beliefs about their own memory abilities and the strategies that they use in their everyday lives to attempt to control their memory. Participants also reported their beliefs about memory change with age for hypothetical target individuals who were described as using (or not using) various means to mitigate memory decline. There were no age differences in personal beliefs about control over current or future memory ability. However, the two age groups differed in the types of strategies they used in their everyday life to control their memory. Young adults were more likely to use internal memory strategies, whereas older adults were more likely to focus on cognitive exercise and maintaining physical health as ways to optimize their memory ability. There were no age differences in rated memory change across the life span in hypothetical individuals. Both young and older adults perceived strategies related to improving physical and cognitive health as effective means of mitigating memory loss with age, whereas internal memory strategies were perceived as less effective means for controlling age-related memory decline. PMID:22082012

Effects of spacing of item repetitions in continuous recognition memory: does item retrieval difficulty promote item retention in older adults?

PubMed

Kılıç, Aslı; Hoyer, William J; Howard, Marc W

2013-01-01

BACKGROUND/STUDY CONTEXT: Older adults exhibit an age-related deficit in item memory as a function of the length of the retention interval, but older adults and young adults usually show roughly equivalent benefits due to the spacing of item repetitions in continuous memory tasks. The current experiment investigates the seemingly paradoxical effects of retention interval and spacing in young and older adults using a continuous recognition memory procedure. Fifty young adults and 52 older adults gave memory confidence ratings to words that were presented once (P1), twice (P2), or three times (P3), and the effects of the lag length and retention interval were assessed at P2 and at P3, respectively. Response times at P2 were disproportionately longer for older adults than for younger adults as a function of the number of items occurring between P1 and P2, suggestive of age-related loss in item memory. Ratings of confidence in memory responses revealed that older adults remembered fewer items at P2 with a high degree of certainty. Confidence ratings given at P3 suggested that young and older adults derived equivalent benefits from the spacing between P1 and P2. Findings of this study support theoretical accounts that suggest that recursive reminding and/or item retrieval difficulty promote item retention in older adults.

Risk factors for head and neck cancer in young adults: a pooled analysis in the INHANCE consortium.

PubMed

Toporcov, Tatiana Natasha; Znaor, Ariana; Zhang, Zuo-Feng; Yu, Guo-Pei; Winn, Deborah M; Wei, Qingyi; Vilensky, Marta; Vaughan, Thomas; Thomson, Peter; Talamini, Renato; Szeszenia-Dabrowska, Neonila; Sturgis, Erich M; Smith, Elaine; Shangina, Oxana; Schwartz, Stephen M; Schantz, Stimson; Rudnai, Peter; Richiardi, Lorenzo; Ramroth, Heribert; Purdue, Mark P; Olshan, Andrew F; Eluf-Neto, José; Muscat, Joshua; Moyses, Raquel Ajub; Morgenstern, Hal; Menezes, Ana; McClean, Michael; Matsuo, Keitaro; Mates, Dana; Macfarlane, Tatiana V; Lissowska, Jolanta; Levi, Fabio; Lazarus, Philip; La Vecchia, Carlo; Lagiou, Pagona; Koifman, Sergio; Kjaerheim, Kristina; Kelsey, Karl; Holcatova, Ivana; Herrero, Rolando; Healy, Claire; Hayes, Richard B; Franceschi, Silvia; Fernandez, Leticia; Fabianova, Eleonora; Daudt, Alexander W; Curioni, Otávio Alberto; Maso, Luigino Dal; Curado, Maria Paula; Conway, David I; Chen, Chu; Castellsague, Xavier; Canova, Cristina; Cadoni, Gabriella; Brennan, Paul; Boccia, Stefania; Antunes, José Leopoldo Ferreira; Ahrens, Wolfgang; Agudo, Antonio; Boffetta, Paolo; Hashibe, Mia; Lee, Yuan-Chin Amy; Filho, Victor Wünsch

2015-02-01

Increasing incidence of head and neck cancer (HNC) in young adults has been reported. We aimed to compare the role of major risk factors and family history of cancer in HNC in young adults and older patients. We pooled data from 25 case-control studies and conducted separate analyses for adults ≤ 45 years old ('young adults', 2010 cases and 4042 controls) and >45 years old ('older adults', 17700 cases and 22 704 controls). Using logistic regression with studies treated as random effects, we estimated adjusted odds ratios (ORs) and 95% confidence intervals (CIs). The young group of cases had a higher proportion of oral tongue cancer (16.0% in women; 11.0% in men) and unspecified oral cavity / oropharynx cancer (16.2%; 11.1%) and a lower proportion of larynx cancer (12.1%; 16.6%) than older adult cases. The proportions of never smokers or never drinkers among female cases were higher than among male cases in both age groups. Positive associations with HNC and duration or pack-years of smoking and drinking were similar across age groups. However, the attributable fractions (AFs) for smoking and drinking were lower in young when compared with older adults (AFs for smoking in young women, older women, young men and older men, respectively, = 19.9% (95% CI=9.8%, 27.9%), 48.9% (46.6%, 50.8%), 46.2% (38.5%, 52.5%), 64.3% (62.2%, 66.4%); AFs for drinking=5.3% (-11.2%, 18.0%), 20.0% (14.5%, 25.0%), 21.5% (5.0%, 34.9%) and 50.4% (46.1%, 54.3%). A family history of early-onset cancer was associated with HNC risk in the young [OR=2.27 (95% CI=1.26, 4.10)], but not in the older adults [OR=1.10 (0.91, 1.31)]. The attributable fraction for family history of early-onset cancer was 23.2% (8.60% to 31.4%) in young compared with 2.20% (-2.41%, 5.80%) in older adults. Differences in HNC aetiology according to age group may exist. The lower AF of cigarette smoking and alcohol drinking in young adults may be due to the reduced length of exposure due to the lower age. Other

The self-reference effect on episodic memory recollection in young and older adults and Alzheimer's disease.

PubMed

Lalanne, Jennifer; Rozenberg, Johanna; Grolleau, Pauline; Piolino, Pascale

2013-12-01

The Self-reference effect (SRE) on long-term episodic memory and autonoetic consciousness has been investigated in young adults, scarcely in older adults, but never in Alzheimer's patients. Is the functional influence of Selfreference still present when the individual's memory and identity are impaired? We investigated this issue in 60 young subjects, 41 elderly subjects, and 28 patients with Alzheimer's disease, by using 1) an incidental learning task of personality traits in three encoding conditions, inducing variable degrees of depth of processing and personal involvement, 2) a 2- minute retention interval free recall task, and 3) a 20-minute delayed recognition task, combined with a remember-know paradigm. Each recorded score was corrected for errors (intrusions in free recall, false alarms in recognition, and false source memory in remember responses). Compared with alternative encodings, the Self-reference significantly enhanced performance on the free recall task in the young group, and on the recognition task both in the young and older groups but not in the Alzheimer group. The most important finding in the Alzheimer group is that the Self-reference led the most often to a subjective sense of remembering (especially for the positive words) with the retrieval of the correct encoding source. This Self-reference recollection effect in patients was related to independent subjective measures of a positive and definite sense of Self (measured by the Tennessee Self Concept Scale), and to memory complaints in daily life. In conclusion, these results demonstrated the power and robustness of the Self-reference effect on recollection in long-term episodic memory in Alzheimer's disease, albeit the retrieval is considerably reduced. These results should open new perspectives for the development of rehabilitation programs for memory deficits.

Predictors of suicide ideation among older adults with bipolar disorder.

PubMed

O'Rourke, Norm; Heisel, Marnin J; Canham, Sarah L; Sixsmith, Andrew

2017-01-01

Bipolar disorder (BD) carries the greatest risk of death by suicide of all psychiatric conditions as 25%-50% of those with BD will make one or more suicide attempt, and about 15% will intentionally end their lives. Among young adults with BD, substance misuse, medication non-adherence, age at onset, and comorbid psychiatric conditions each predict self-harm. It is currently unclear if these same factors or others predict suicide ideation among older adults with BD. We recruited a global sample of 220 older adults with BD over 19 days using socio-demographically targeted, social media advertising and online data collection (Mean = 58.50, SD = 5.42; range 50 to 81 years). Path analyses allowed us to identify direct and indirect predictors of suicide ideation among older adults with BD. Cognitive failures (perception, memory, and motor function), depressive symptoms, alcohol misuse, and dissatisfaction with life as direct predictors of suicide ideation; duration of BD symptoms and medication non-adherence emerged as indirect predictors. Of note, the significant impact of sleep on suicide ideation is indirect via depressive symptoms, cognitive failures, medication non-adherence and life dissatisfaction. As with young adults with BD, alcohol misuse and medication non-adherence emerged as significant predictors of suicide ideation. In addition, cognitive failures directly and indirectly predict suicide ideation in this sample of older adults with BD. Population aging and treatment efficacy are leading to ever growing numbers of older adults with BD. Both direct and indirect predictors of suicide ideation need to be considered in future BD research and treatment planning.

Older adults utilize less efficient postural control when performing pushing task.

PubMed

Lee, Yun-Ju; Chen, Bing; Aruin, Alexander S

2015-12-01

The ability to maintain balance deteriorates with increasing age. The aim was to investigate the role of age in generation of anticipatory (APA) and compensatory (CPA) postural adjustments during pushing an object. Older (68.8 ± 1.0 years) and young adults (30.1 ± 1.4 years) participated in the experiment involving pushing an object (a pendulum attached to the ceiling) using both hands. Electrical activity of six leg and trunk muscles and displacements of the center of pressure (COP) were recorded and analyzed during the APA and CPA phases. The onset time, integrals of muscle activity, and COP displacements were determined. In addition, the indexes of co-activation and reciprocal activation of muscles for the shank, thigh, and trunk segments were calculated. Older adults, compared to young adults, showed less efficient postural control seen as delayed anticipatory muscle onset times and delayed COP displacements. Moreover, older adults used co-activation of muscles during the CPA phase while younger subjects utilized reciprocal activation of muscles. The observed diminished efficiency of postural control during both anticipatory and compensatory postural adjustments observed in older adults might predispose them to falls while performing tasks involving pushing. The outcome provides a background for future studies focused on the optimization of the daily activities of older adults. Copyright © 2015 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

Destination memory accuracy and confidence in younger and older adults.

PubMed

Johnson, Tara L; Jefferson, Susan C

2018-01-01

Background/Study Context: Nascent research on destination memory-remembering to whom we tell particular information-suggested that older adults have deficits in destination memory and are more confident on inaccurate responses than younger adults. This study assessed the effects of age, attentional resources, and mental imagery on destination memory accuracy and confidence in younger and older adults. Using computer format, participants told facts to pictures of famous people in one of four conditions (control, self-focus, refocus, imagery). Older adults had lower destination memory accuracy than younger adults, driven by a higher level of false alarms. Whereas younger adults were more confident in accurate answers, older adults were more confident in inaccurate answers. Accuracy across participants was lowest when attention was directed internally but significantly improved when mental imagery was used. Importantly, the age-related differences in false alarms and high-confidence inaccurate answers disappeared when imagery was used. Older adults are more likely than younger adults to commit destination memory errors and are less accurate in related confidence judgments. Furthermore, the use of associative memory strategies may help improve destination memory across age groups, improve the accuracy of confidence judgments in older adults, and decrease age-related destination memory impairment, particularly in young-old adults.

The effect of cell phone use on postural balance and mobility in older compared to young adults.

PubMed

Laatar, Rabeb; Kachouri, Hiba; Borji, Rihab; Rebai, Haithem; Sahli, Sonia

2017-05-01

Cell phone use is considered as an essential part of everyday life saturating all age groups and demographics. This study aimed to explore the effect of various cell phone functions on postural control and mobility in the elderly. Twenty healthy older (mean age 72.5±2.9) and twenty young (26.3±2.8) adults participated in this study. Postural balance was assessed by measuring the center of pressure (CoP) displacement with (talking on a cell phone (CONVERSE), dialing a number (DIAL) and listening to music (MUSIC)) and without cell phone use. Mobility was assessed by the Timed Up and Go Test (TUGT). Results showed that for both groups, the CoP parameters increased significantly during the CONVERSE (p<0.001) and the DIAL (CoP area , CoP X : p<0.05; CoP Y : p<0.01) conditions compared to the control condition. Moreover, the CoP area values were significantly higher during the CONVERSE condition in comparison to the DIAL (p<0.05) one. In older adults, the TUGT scores increased significantly in the DIAL (p<0.01) condition compared to the CONVERSE and the MUSIC conditions. In conclusion, cell phone use impairs similarly standing postural balance of elderly and young adults. Interestingly, in the elderly, all cell phone functions used altered mobility with the dialing function causing the largest mobility deterioration. Copyright © 2017 Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.

Peripheral vision and perceptual asymmetries in young and older martial arts athletes and nonathletes.

PubMed

Muiños, Mónica; Ballesteros, Soledad

2014-11-01

The present study investigated peripheral vision (PV) and perceptual asymmetries in young and older martial arts athletes (judo and karate athletes) and compared their performance with that of young and older nonathletes. Stimuli were dots presented at three different eccentricities along the horizontal, oblique, and vertical diameters and three interstimulus intervals. Experiment 1 showed that although the two athlete groups were faster in almost all conditions, karate athletes performed significantly better than nonathlete participants when stimuli were presented in the peripheral visual field. Experiment 2 showed that older participants who had practiced a martial art at a competitive level when they were young were significantly faster than sedentary older adults of the same age. The practiced sport (judo or karate) did not affect performance differentially, suggesting that it is the practice of martial arts that is the crucial factor, rather than the type of martial art. Importantly, older athletes lose their PV advantage, as compared with young athletes. Finally, we found that physical activity (young and older athletes) and age (young and older adults) did not alter the visual asymmetries that vary as a function of spatial location; all participants were faster for stimuli presented along the horizontal than for those presented along the vertical meridian and for those presented at the lower rather than at the upper locations within the vertical meridian. These results indicate that the practice of these martial arts is an effective way of counteracting the processing speed decline of visual stimuli appearing at any visual location and speed.

Young adult smoking behavior: a national survey.

PubMed

Ling, Pamela M; Neilands, Torsten B; Glantz, Stanton A

2009-05-01

Young adults have the highest smoking rate of any age group in the U.S., and new strategies to decrease young adult smoking are needed. The objective of the current study was to identify psychographic and demographic factors associated with current smoking and quitting behaviors among young adults. Attitudes, social groups, and self-descriptors, including supporting action against the tobacco industry, advertising receptivity, depression, alcohol use, and other factors associated with smoking were tested for associations with smoking behaviors in a 2005 cross-sectional survey of 1528 young adults (aged 18-25 years) from a web-enabled panel. Analyses were conducted in 2007. Being older was associated with current smoking, whereas having some higher education and being African American or Hispanic were negatively associated with smoking. Supporting action against the tobacco industry was negatively associated with smoking (AOR=0.34 [95% CI=0.22, 0.52]). Perceived usefulness of smoking, exposure to smokers, increased perceived smoking prevalence, receptivity to tobacco advertising, binge drinking, and exposure to tobacco advertising in bars and clubs were associated with smoking. Supporting action against the tobacco industry was associated with intentions to quit smoking (AOR=4.43 [95% CI=2.18, 8.60]). Young adults are vulnerable to tobacco-industry advertising. Media campaigns that denormalize the tobacco industry and appeal to young adults appear to be a powerful intervention to decrease young adult smoking.

Expiratory flow limitation and operating lung volumes during exercise in older and younger adults.

PubMed

Smith, Joshua R; Kurti, Stephanie P; Meskimen, Kayla; Harms, Craig A

2017-06-01

We determined the effect of aging on expiratory flow limitation (EFL) and operating lung volumes when matched for lung size. We hypothesized that older adults will exhibit greater EFL and increases in EELV during exercise compared to younger controls. Ten older (5M/5W; >60years old) and nineteen height-matched young adults (10M/9W) were recruited. Young adults were matched for%predicted forced vital capacity (FVC) (Y-matched%Pred FVC; n=10) and absolute FVC (Y-matched FVC; n=10). Tidal flow-volume loops were recorded during the incremental exercise test with maximal flow-volume loops measured pre- and post-exercise. Compared to younger controls, older adults exhibited more EFL at ventilations of 26, 35, 51, and 80L/min. The older group had higher end-inspiratory lung volume compared to Y-matched%Pred FVC group during submaximal ventilations. The older group increased EELV during exercise, while EELV stayed below resting in the Y-matched%Pred FVC group. These data suggest older adults exhibit more EFL and increase EELV earlier during exercise compared to younger adults. Copyright © 2017 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.

Risk factors for head and neck cancer in young adults: a pooled analysis in the INHANCE consortium

PubMed Central

Toporcov, Tatiana Natasha; Znaor, Ariana; Zhang, Zuo-Feng; Yu, Guo-Pei; Winn, Deborah M; Wei, Qingyi; Vilensky, Marta; Vaughan, Thomas; Thomson, Peter; Talamini, Renato; Szeszenia-Dabrowska, Neonila; Sturgis, Erich M; Smith, Elaine; Shangina, Oxana; Schwartz, Stephen M; Schantz, Stimson; Rudnai, Peter; Richiardi, Lorenzo; Ramroth, Heribert; Purdue, Mark P; Olshan, Andrew F; Eluf-Neto, José; Muscat, Joshua; Moyses, Raquel Ajub; Morgenstern, Hal; Menezes, Ana; McClean, Michael; Matsuo, Keitaro; Mates, Dana; Macfarlane, Tatiana V; Lissowska, Jolanta; Levi, Fabio; Lazarus, Philip; Vecchia, Carlo La; Lagiou, Pagona; Koifman, Sergio; Kjaerheim, Kristina; Kelsey, Karl; Holcatova, Ivana; Herrero, Rolando; Healy, Claire; Hayes, Richard B; Franceschi, Silvia; Fernandez, Leticia; Fabianova, Eleonora; Daudt, Alexander W; Curioni, Otávio Alberto; Maso, Luigino Dal; Curado, Maria Paula; Conway, David I; Chen, Chu; Castellsague, Xavier; Canova, Cristina; Cadoni, Gabriella; Brennan, Paul; Boccia, Stefania; Antunes, José Leopoldo Ferreira; Ahrens, Wolfgang; Agudo, Antonio; Boffetta, Paolo; Hashibe, Mia; Lee, Yuan-Chin Amy; Filho, Victor Wünsch

2015-01-01

Background: Increasing incidence of head and neck cancer (HNC) in young adults has been reported. We aimed to compare the role of major risk factors and family history of cancer in HNC in young adults and older patients. Methods: We pooled data from 25 case-control studies and conducted separate analyses for adults ≤45 years old (‘young adults’, 2010 cases and 4042 controls) and >45 years old (‘older adults’, 17 700 cases and 22 704 controls). Using logistic regression with studies treated as random effects, we estimated adjusted odds ratios (ORs) and 95% confidence intervals (CIs). Results: The young group of cases had a higher proportion of oral tongue cancer (16.0% in women; 11.0% in men) and unspecified oral cavity / oropharynx cancer (16.2%; 11.1%) and a lower proportion of larynx cancer (12.1%; 16.6%) than older adult cases. The proportions of never smokers or never drinkers among female cases were higher than among male cases in both age groups. Positive associations with HNC and duration or pack-years of smoking and drinking were similar across age groups. However, the attributable fractions (AFs) for smoking and drinking were lower in young when compared with older adults (AFs for smoking in young women, older women, young men and older men, respectively, = 19.9% (95% CI = 9.8%, 27.9%), 48.9% (46.6%, 50.8%), 46.2% (38.5%, 52.5%), 64.3% (62.2%, 66.4%); AFs for drinking = 5.3% (−11.2%, 18.0%), 20.0% (14.5%, 25.0%), 21.5% (5.0%, 34.9%) and 50.4% (46.1%, 54.3%). A family history of early-onset cancer was associated with HNC risk in the young [OR = 2.27 (95% CI = 1.26, 4.10)], but not in the older adults [OR = 1.10 (0.91, 1.31)]. The attributable fraction for family history of early-onset cancer was 23.2% (8.60% to 31.4%) in young compared with 2.20% (−2.41%, 5.80%) in older adults. Conclusions: Differences in HNC aetiology according to age group may exist. The lower AF of cigarette smoking and alcohol drinking in young

[Hodgkin and non-Hodgkin lymphoma of adolescents and young adults].

PubMed

Garciaz, Sylvain; Coso, Diane; Brice, Pauline; Bouabdallah, Réda

2016-12-01

Lymphoma is one of the most frequent cancers in adolescent and young adults. Hodgkin Lymphoma is curable in more than 90% of cases. Recent pediatric and adults protocols aimed to decrease long term toxicities (mostly gonadic and cardiovascular) and secondary malignancies, reducing the use of alkylating agents and limiting radiation fields. Risk-adapted strategies, using positron emission tomography staging, are about to become a standard, both in adult and pediatric protocols. These approaches allow obtaining excellent results in adolescents with Hodgkin lymphoma. On the other hand, treatment of adolescents with diffuse large B-cell lymphoma raises some questions. Even through children have good outcomes when treated with risk-adapted strategies, adolescents who are between 15 and 18 years old seem to experience poorer survivals, whereas patients older than 18 years old have globally the same outcome than older adults. This category of patient needs a particular care, based on a tight coordination between adults and pediatric oncologists. Primary mediastinal lymphomas, a subtype of BLDCL frequent in young adult population, exhibits poorer outcomes in children or young adolescent population than in older ones. Taking together, B-cell lymphoma benefited from recent advances in immunotherapy (in particular with the extended utilization of rituximab) and metabolic response-adapted strategies. In conclusion, adolescent and young adult's lymphomas are very curable diseases but require a personalized management in onco-hematological units. Copyright © 2016 Société Française du Cancer. Published by Elsevier Masson SAS. All rights reserved.

Trends in the Prevalence, Awareness, Treatment, and Control of Hypertension Among Young Adults in the United States, 1999 to 2014.

PubMed

Zhang, Yiyi; Moran, Andrew E

2017-10-01

Overall hypertension prevalence has not changed in the United States in recent decades although awareness, treatment, and control improved. However, hypertension epidemiology and its temporal trends may differ in younger adults compared with older adults. Our study included 41 331 participants ≥18 years of age from 8 National Health and Nutrition Examination Surveys (1999-2014) and estimated temporal trends of hypertension, awareness, treatment, and control among young adults (age, 18-39 years) compared with middle-age (age, 40-59 years) and older adults (age, ≥60 years). In 2013 to 2014, 7.3% of the US young adults had hypertension. During 1999 to 2014, young adults saw larger increases in hypertension awareness, treatment, and control than did older adults. However, all of these components of hypertension control were lower among young adults compared with middle-aged or older adults (74.7% younger versus 81.9% middle versus 88.4% older for awareness; 50.0% versus 70.3% versus 83.0% for treatment; and 40.2% versus 56.7% versus 54.4% for control). Worse hypertension awareness, treatment, and control in young adults overall were mostly driven by worse measures in young adult men compared with young adult women. More frequent healthcare visits by young adult women explained ≈28% of the sex-related difference in awareness, 60% of the difference in treatment, and 52% of the difference in control. These findings suggest that improved access to and engagement in medical care might improve hypertension control in young adults, particularly young adult men, and reduce life-time cardiovascular risk. © 2017 American Heart Association, Inc.

Beliefs about age-related changes in physical functioning across the adult life span and their relationship with physical activity levels of older adults.

PubMed

Lineweaver, Tara T; Kugler, Jennifer; Rabellino, Alessandra; Stephan, Yannick

2018-07-01

Physical activity declines across the adult life span despite the well-established links between physical activity and health-related, psychological, cognitive, and social benefits. We contrasted the beliefs young and older adults hold about how aging affects both physical abilities and physical activity and determined whether older adults' beliefs about physical aging relate to their engagement in physical activity. Using visual rating scales, 56 young and 49 community-dwelling older adults indicated the extent to which a typical woman or typical man aged 20-90 possesses six different physical abilities and engages in three different types of physical activity. Stereotypes of physical aging were ability- and activity-specific, and older adults endorsed more positive views than their younger peers. Stereotypical beliefs predicted older adults' engagement in moderate-intensity activity. This study offers intriguing avenues for future research and suggests that better understanding physical aging stereotypes may contribute toward designing interventions that promote lifelong physical activity.

Evidence for a young adult-targeted tobacco control campaign stimulating cessation-related responses among adult smokers and recent quitters.

PubMed

Li, Judy; Guiney, Hayley; Walton, Darren

2016-02-19

Young adults are an important group for tobacco control interventions because of their high smoking prevalence. In 2014, New Zealand launched a young adult-targeted tobacco control campaign: 'Stop Before You Start'. The evaluation undertaken with young adults (aged 18 to 24 years) showed that the campaign exerted positive impacts on this age group. This study aimed to investigate the collateral effects of this campaign on older adults. Data were collected from a fortnightly survey of adult smokers and recent quitters, where respondents were maintained on a panel and interviewed every fortnight, up to six times. This paper reports on data collected over three consecutive fortnights (540 interviews). Ten measures were used to assess campaign effectiveness (eg, felt regret, tried to quit). After adjusting for recent quit attempt status and socio-demographic characteristics, age differences were not found in any of the outcome variables (aged 25-44 years and 45+ years were compared against 18-24 years). Internationally, little is known about the effectiveness of young adult-targeted tobacco control campaigns. Alongside data from the campaign evaluation with young adults, findings from the current study suggest that this young adult-targeted campaign also created a desirable impact on older adults.

Structural Variation within the Amygdala and Ventromedial Prefrontal Cortex Predicts Memory for Impressions in Older Adults

PubMed Central

Cassidy, Brittany S.; Gutchess, Angela H.

2012-01-01

Research has shown that lesions to regions involved in social and emotional cognition disrupt socioemotional processing and memory. We investigated how structural variation of regions involved in socioemotional memory [ventromedial prefrontal cortex (vmPFC), amygdala], as opposed to a region implicated in explicit memory (hippocampus), affected memory for impressions in young and older adults. Anatomical MRI scans for 15 young and 15 older adults were obtained and reconstructed to gather information about cortical thickness and subcortical volume. Young adults had greater amygdala and hippocampus volumes than old, and thicker left vmPFC than old, although right vmPFC thickness did not differ across the age groups. Participants formed behavior-based impressions and responded to interpersonally meaningful, social but interpersonally irrelevant, or non-social prompts, and completed a memory test. Results showed that greater left amygdala volume predicted enhanced overall memory for impressions in older but not younger adults. Increased right vmPFC thickness in older, but not younger, adults correlated with enhanced memory for impressions formed in the interpersonally meaningful context. Hippocampal volume was not predictive of social memory in young or older adults. These findings demonstrate the importance of structural variation in regions linked to socioemotional processing in the retention of impressions with age, and suggest that the amygdala and vmPFC play integral roles when encoding and retrieving social information. PMID:22973250

Predictors of suicide ideation among older adults with bipolar disorder

PubMed Central

Heisel, Marnin J.; Canham, Sarah L.; Sixsmith, Andrew

2017-01-01

Objectives Bipolar disorder (BD) carries the greatest risk of death by suicide of all psychiatric conditions as 25%–50% of those with BD will make one or more suicide attempt, and about 15% will intentionally end their lives. Among young adults with BD, substance misuse, medication non-adherence, age at onset, and comorbid psychiatric conditions each predict self-harm. It is currently unclear if these same factors or others predict suicide ideation among older adults with BD. Methods We recruited a global sample of 220 older adults with BD over 19 days using socio-demographically targeted, social media advertising and online data collection (Mean = 58.50, SD = 5.42; range 50 to 81 years). Path analyses allowed us to identify direct and indirect predictors of suicide ideation among older adults with BD. Results Cognitive failures (perception, memory, and motor function), depressive symptoms, alcohol misuse, and dissatisfaction with life as direct predictors of suicide ideation; duration of BD symptoms and medication non-adherence emerged as indirect predictors. Of note, the significant impact of sleep on suicide ideation is indirect via depressive symptoms, cognitive failures, medication non-adherence and life dissatisfaction. Conclusions As with young adults with BD, alcohol misuse and medication non-adherence emerged as significant predictors of suicide ideation. In addition, cognitive failures directly and indirectly predict suicide ideation in this sample of older adults with BD. Population aging and treatment efficacy are leading to ever growing numbers of older adults with BD. Both direct and indirect predictors of suicide ideation need to be considered in future BD research and treatment planning. PMID:29145409

Turn Off the Music! Music Impairs Visual Associative Memory Performance in Older Adults

PubMed Central

Reaves, Sarah; Graham, Brittany; Grahn, Jessica; Rabannifard, Parissa; Duarte, Audrey

2016-01-01

Purpose of the Study: Whether we are explicitly listening to it or not, music is prevalent in our environment. Surprisingly, little is known about the effect of environmental music on concurrent cognitive functioning and whether young and older adults are differentially affected by music. Here, we investigated the impact of background music on a concurrent paired associate learning task in healthy young and older adults. Design and Methods: Young and older adults listened to music or to silence while simultaneously studying face–name pairs. Participants’ memory for the pairs was then tested while listening to either the same or different music. Participants also made subjective ratings about how distracting they found each song to be. Results: Despite the fact that all participants rated music as more distracting to their performance than silence, only older adults’ associative memory performance was impaired by music. These results are most consistent with the theory that older adults’ failure to inhibit processing of distracting task-irrelevant information, in this case background music, contributes to their memory impairments. Implications: These data have important practical implications for older adults’ ability to perform cognitively demanding tasks even in what many consider to be an unobtrusive environment. PMID:26035876

Motor Variability during Sustained Contractions Increases with Cognitive Demand in Older Adults

PubMed Central

Vanden Noven, Marnie L.; Pereira, Hugo M.; Yoon, Tejin; Stevens, Alyssa A.; Nielson, Kristy A.; Hunter, Sandra K.

2014-01-01

To expose cortical involvement in age-related changes in motor performance, we compared steadiness (force fluctuations) and fatigability of submaximal isometric contractions with the ankle dorsiflexor muscles in older and young adults and with varying levels of cognitive demand imposed. Sixteen young (20.4 ± 2.1 year: 8 men, 9 women) and 17 older adults (68.8 ± 4.4 years: 9 men, 8 women) attended three sessions and performed a 40 s isometric contraction at 5% maximal voluntary contraction (MVC) force followed by an isometric contraction at 30% MVC until task failure. The cognitive demand required during the submaximal contractions in each session differed as follows: (1) high-cognitive demand session where difficult mental math was imposed (counting backward by 13 from a 4-digit number); (2) low-cognitive demand session which involved simple mental math (counting backward by 1); and (3) control session with no mental math. Anxiety was elevated during the high-cognitive demand session compared with other sessions for both age groups but more so for the older adults than young adults (p  < 0.05). Older adults had larger force fluctuations than young adults during: (1) the 5% MVC task as cognitive demand increased (p  = 0.007), and (2) the fatiguing contraction for all sessions (p  = 0.002). Time to task failure did not differ between sessions or age groups (p  > 0.05), but the variability between sessions (standard deviation of three sessions) was greater for older adults than young (2.02 ± 1.05 vs. 1.25 ± 0.51 min, p  < 0.05). Thus, variability in lower limb motor performance for low- and moderate-force isometric tasks increased with age and was exacerbated when cognitive demand was imposed, and may be related to modulation of synergist and antagonist muscles and an altered neural strategy with age originating from central sources. These data have significant implications for cognitively demanding low-force motor tasks

Measuring moderate-intensity walking in older adults using the ActiGraph accelerometer.

PubMed

Barnett, Anthony; van den Hoek, Daniel; Barnett, David; Cerin, Ester

2016-12-08

Accelerometry is the method of choice for objectively assessing physical activity in older adults. Many studies have used an accelerometer count cut point corresponding to 3 metabolic equivalents (METs) derived in young adults during treadmill walking and running with a resting metabolic rate (RMR) assumed at 3.5 mL · kg -1  · min -1 (corresponding to 1 MET). RMR is lower in older adults; therefore, their 3 MET level occurs at a lower absolute energy expenditure making the cut point derived from young adults inappropriate for this population. The few studies determining older adult specific moderate-to-vigorous intensity physical activity (MVPA) cut points had methodological limitations, such as not measuring RMR and using treadmill walking. This study determined a MVPA hip-worn accelerometer cut point for older adults using measured RMR and overground walking. Following determination of RMR, 45 older adults (mean age 70.2 ± 7 years, range 60-87.6 years) undertook an outdoor, overground walking protocol with accelerometer count and energy expenditure determined at five walking speeds. Mean RMR was 2.8 ± 0.6 mL · kg -1  · min -1 . The MVPA cut points (95% CI) determined using linear mixed models were: vertical axis 1013 (734, 1292) counts · min -1 ; vector magnitude 1924 (1657, 2192) counts · min -1 ; and walking speed 2.5 (2.2, 2.8) km · hr -1 . High levels of inter-individual variability in cut points were found. These MVPA accelerometer and speed cut points for walking, the most popular physical activity in older adults, were lower than those for younger adults. Using cut points determined in younger adults for older adult population studies is likely to underestimate time spent engaged in MVPA. In addition, prescription of walking speed based on the adult cut point is likely to result in older adults working at a higher intensity than intended.

Assessing the use of immersive virtual reality, mouse and touchscreen in pointing and dragging-and-dropping tasks among young, middle-aged and older adults.

PubMed

Chen, Jiayin; Or, Calvin

2017-11-01

This study assessed the use of an immersive virtual reality (VR), a mouse and a touchscreen for one-directional pointing, multi-directional pointing, and dragging-and-dropping tasks involving targets of smaller and larger widths by young (n = 18; 18-30 years), middle-aged (n = 18; 40-55 years) and older adults (n = 18; 65-75 years). A three-way, mixed-factorial design was used for data collection. The dependent variables were the movement time required and the error rate. Our main findings were that the participants took more time and made more errors in using the VR input interface than in using the mouse or the touchscreen. This pattern applied in all three age groups in all tasks, except for multi-directional pointing with a larger target width among the older group. Overall, older adults took longer to complete the tasks and made more errors than young or middle-aged adults. Larger target widths yielded shorter movement times and lower error rates in pointing tasks, but larger targets yielded higher rates of error in dragging-and-dropping tasks. Our study indicated that any other virtual environments that are similar to those we tested may be more suitable for displaying scenes than for manipulating objects that are small and require fine control. Although interacting with VR is relatively difficult, especially for older adults, there is still potential for older adults to adapt to that interface. Furthermore, adjusting the width of objects according to the type of manipulation required might be an effective way to promote performance. Copyright © 2017 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

Assessing Articulatory Speed Performance as a Potential Factor of Slowed Speech in Older Adults

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Mefferd, Antje S.; Corder, Erin E.

2014-01-01

Purpose: To improve our understanding about the underlying factors of aging-related speaking rate decline, the authors sought to determine if lip and jaw speeds are physiologically constrained in older adults. Method: Thirty-six female--10 young adults (ages 22-27 years), 9 middle-aged adults (ages 45-55 years), 10 young-old adults (65-74 years),…

How Japanese adults perceive memory change with age: middle-aged adults with memory performance as high as young adults evaluate their memory abilities as low as older adults.

PubMed

Kinjo, Hikari; Shimizu, Hiroyuki

2014-01-01

The characteristics of self-referent beliefs about memory change with age. The relationship between beliefs and memory performance of three age groups of Japanese adults was investigated. The beliefs measured by the Personal Beliefs about Memory Instrument (Lineweaver & Hertzog, 1998) differed among the age groups and between sexes. In most scales, the ratings by middle-aged adults were as low as those by older adults, which were lower than those by young adults. Women perceived their memory abilities as lower than men's, with no interaction between age and sex, suggesting the difference remains across the lifespan. For middle-aged adults, the better they performed in cued-recall, free recall, and recognition, the lower they evaluated their memory self-efficacy, while few relationships were found for other groups. Our results suggest that cognitive beliefs change with age and that investigating the beliefs of the middle-aged adults is indispensable to elucidate the transition of beliefs.

Semantic Priming During Sentence Processing by Young and Older Adults.

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Burke, Deborah M.; Yee, Penny L.

1984-01-01

Compares the semantic processing skills of younger adults (mean age 25) and older adults (mean age 68). After reading a sentence, subjects performed a task in which responses did not depend on retention. Results provided no evidence for age-related changes, including those associated with access to implied information. (Author/RH)

Age-related self-overestimation of step-over ability in healthy older adults and its relationship to fall risk.

PubMed

Sakurai, Ryota; Fujiwara, Yoshinori; Ishihara, Masami; Higuchi, Takahiro; Uchida, Hayato; Imanaka, Kuniyasu

2013-05-07

Older adults could not safely step over an obstacle unless they correctly estimated their physical ability to be capable of a successful step over action. Thus, incorrect estimation (overestimation) of ability to step over an obstacle could result in severe accident such as falls in older adults. We investigated whether older adults tended to overestimate step-over ability compared with young adults and whether such overestimation in stepping over obstacles was associated with falls. Three groups of adults, young-old (age, 60-74 years; n, 343), old-old (age, >74 years; n, 151), and young (age, 18-35 years; n, 71), performed our original step-over test (SOT). In the SOT, participants observed a horizontal bar at a 7-m distance and estimated the maximum height (EH) that they could step over. After estimation, they performed real SOT trials to measure the actual maximum height (AH). We also identified participants who had experienced falls in the 1 year period before the study. Thirty-nine young-old adults (11.4%) and 49 old-old adults (32.5%) failed to step over the bar at EH (overestimation), whereas all young adults succeeded (underestimation). There was a significant negative correlation between actual performance (AH) and self-estimation error (difference between EH and AH) in the older adults, indicating that older adults with lower AH (SOT ability) tended to overestimate actual ability (EH > AH) and vice versa. Furthermore, the percentage of participants who overestimated SOT ability in the fallers (28%) was almost double larger than that in the non-fallers (16%), with the fallers showing significantly lower SOT ability than the non-fallers. Older adults appear unaware of age-related physical decline and tended to overestimate step-over ability. Both age-related decline in step-over ability, and more importantly, overestimation or decreased underestimation of this ability may raise potential risk of falls.

Do older adults with chronic low back pain differ from younger adults in regards to baseline characteristics and prognosis?

PubMed

Manogharan, S; Kongsted, A; Ferreira, M L; Hancock, M J

2017-05-01

Low back pain (LBP) in older adults is poorly understood because the vast majority of the LBP research has focused on the working aged population. The aim of this study was to compare older adults consulting with chronic LBP to middle aged and young adults consulting with chronic LBP, in terms of their baseline characteristics, and pain and disability outcomes over 1 year. Data were systematically collected as part of routine care in a secondary care spine clinic. At initial presentation patients answered a self-report questionnaire and underwent a physical examination. Patients older than 65 were classified as older adults and compared to middle aged (45-65 years old) and younger adults (17-44 years old) for 10 baseline characteristics. Pain intensity and disability were collected at 6 and 12 month follow-ups and compared between age groups. A total of 14,479 participants were included in the study. Of these 3087 (21%) patients were older adults, 6071 (42%) were middle aged and 5321 (37%) were young adults. At presentation older adults were statistically different to the middle aged and younger adults for most characteristics measured (e.g. less intense back pain, more leg pain and more depression); however, the differences were small. The change in pain and disability over 12 months did not differ between age groups. This study found small baseline differences in older people with chronic LBP compared to middle aged and younger adults. There were no associations between age groups and the clinical course. Small baseline differences exist in older people with chronic low back pain compared to middle aged and younger adults referred to secondary care for chronic low back pain. Older adults present with slightly less intense low back pain but slightly more intense leg pain. Changes in pain intensity and disability over a 12 month period were similar across all age groups. © 2017 European Pain Federation - EFIC®.

Reduced facial reactivity as a contributor to preserved emotion regulation in older adults.

PubMed

Pedder, David J; Terrett, Gill; Bailey, Phoebe E; Henry, Julie D; Ruffman, Ted; Rendell, Peter G

2016-02-01

This study investigated whether differences in the type of strategy used, or age-related differences in intensity of facial reactivity, might contribute to preserved emotion regulation ability in older adults. Young (n = 35) and older (n = 33) adults were instructed to regulate their emotion to positive and negative pictures under 3 conditions (watch, expressive suppression, cognitive 'detached' reappraisal). Participants were objectively monitored using facial electromyography (EMG) and assessed on memory performance. Both age groups were effectively, and equivalently, able to reduce their facial expressions. In relation to facial reactivity, the percentage increase of older adults' facial muscle EMG activity in the watch condition was significantly reduced relative to young adults. Recall of pictures following regulation was similar to the watch condition, and there was no difference in memory performance between the 2 regulation strategies for both groups. These findings do not support the proposal that the type of strategy used explains preserved emotion regulation ability in older adults. Coupled with the lack of memory costs following regulation, these data instead are more consistent with the suggestion that older adults may retain emotion regulation capacity partly because they exhibit less facial reactivity to begin with. (c) 2016 APA, all rights reserved).

Does the Cognitive Reflection Test actually capture heuristic versus analytic reasoning styles in older adults?

PubMed

Hertzog, Christopher; Smith, R Marit; Ariel, Robert

2018-01-01

Background/Study Context: This study evaluated adult age differences in the original three-item Cognitive Reflection Test (CRT; Frederick, 2005, The Journal of Economic Perspectives, 19, 25-42) and an expanded seven-item version of that test (Toplak et al., 2013, Thinking and Reasoning, 20, 147-168). The CRT is a numerical problem-solving test thought to capture a disposition towards either rapid, intuition-based problem solving (Type I reasoning) or a more thoughtful, analytical problem-solving approach (Type II reasoning). Test items are designed to induce heuristically guided errors that can be avoided if using an appropriate numerical representation of the test problems. We evaluated differences between young adults and old adults in CRT performance and correlates of CRT performance. Older adults (ages 60 to 80) were paid volunteers who participated in experiments assessing age differences in self-regulated learning. Young adults (ages 17 to 35) were students participating for pay as part of a project assessing measures of critical thinking skills or as a young comparison group in the self-regulated learning study. There were age differences in the number of CRT correct responses in two independent samples. Results with the original three-item CRT found older adults to have a greater relative proportion of errors based on providing the intuitive lure. However, younger adults actually had a greater proportion of intuitive errors on the long version of the CRT, relative to older adults. Item analysis indicated a much lower internal consistency of CRT items for older adults. These outcomes do not offer full support for the argument that older adults are higher in the use of a "Type I" cognitive style. The evidence was also consistent with an alternative hypothesis that age differences were due to lower levels of numeracy in the older samples. Alternative process-oriented evaluations of how older adults solve CRT items will probably be needed to determine

Deficits in Category Learning in Older Adults: Rule-Based Versus Clustering Accounts

PubMed Central

2017-01-01

Memory research has long been one of the key areas of investigation for cognitive aging researchers but only in the last decade or so has categorization been used to understand age differences in cognition. Categorization tasks focus more heavily on the grouping and organization of items in memory, and often on the process of learning relationships through trial and error. Categorization studies allow researchers to more accurately characterize age differences in cognition: whether older adults show declines in the way in which they represent categories with simple rules or declines in representing categories by similarity to past examples. In the current study, young and older adults participated in a set of classic category learning problems, which allowed us to distinguish between three hypotheses: (a) rule-complexity: categories were represented exclusively with rules and older adults had differential difficulty when more complex rules were required, (b) rule-specific: categories could be represented either by rules or by similarity, and there were age deficits in using rules, and (c) clustering: similarity was mainly used and older adults constructed a less-detailed representation by lumping more items into fewer clusters. The ordinal levels of performance across different conditions argued against rule-complexity, as older adults showed greater deficits on less complex categories. The data also provided evidence against rule-specificity, as single-dimensional rules could not explain age declines. Instead, computational modeling of the data indicated that older adults utilized fewer conceptual clusters of items in memory than did young adults. PMID:28816474

The hypercorrection effect in younger and older adults.

PubMed

Eich, Teal S; Stern, Yaakov; Metcalfe, Janet

2013-01-01

ABSTRACT The hypercorrection effect, which refers to the finding that errors committed with high confidence are more likely to be corrected than are low confidence errors, has been replicated many times, and with both young adults and children. In the present study, we contrasted older with younger adults. Participants answered general-information questions, made confidence ratings about their answers, were given corrective feedback, and then were retested on questions that they had gotten wrong. While younger adults showed the hypercorrection effect, older adults, despite higher overall accuracy on the general-information questions and excellent basic metacognitive ability, showed a diminished hypercorrection effect. Indeed, the correspondence between their confidence in their errors and the probability of correction was not significantly greater than zero, showing, for the first time, that a particular participant population is selectively impaired on this error correction task. These results potentially offer leverage both on the mechanisms underlying the hypercorrection effect and on reasons for older adults' memory impairments, as well as on memory functions that are spared.

Natural Experience Modulates the Processing of Older Adult Faces in Young Adults and 3-Year-Old Children

PubMed Central

Proietti, Valentina; Pisacane, Antonella; Macchi Cassia, Viola

2013-01-01

Just like other face dimensions, age influences the way faces are processed by adults as well as by children. However, it remains unclear under what conditions exactly such influence occurs at both ages, in that there is some mixed evidence concerning the presence of a systematic processing advantage for peer faces (own-age bias) across the lifespan. Inconsistency in the results may stem from the fact that the individual’s face representation adapts to represent the most predominant age traits of the faces present in the environment, which is reflective of the individual’s specific living conditions and social experience. In the current study we investigated the processing of younger and older adult faces in two groups of adults (Experiment 1) and two groups of 3-year-old children (Experiment 2) who accumulated different amounts of experience with elderly people. Contact with elderly adults influenced the extent to which both adult and child participants showed greater discrimination abilities and stronger sensitivity to configural/featural cues in younger versus older adult faces, as measured by the size of the inversion effect. In children, the size of the inversion effect for older adult faces was also significantly correlated with the amount of contact with elderly people. These results show that, in both adults and children, visual experience with older adult faces can tune perceptual processing strategies to the point of abolishing the discrimination disadvantage that participants typically manifest for those faces in comparison to younger adult faces. PMID:23460867

Preservation of skeletal muscle mitochondrial content in older adults: relationship between mitochondria, fibre type and high-intensity exercise training.

PubMed

Wyckelsma, Victoria L; Levinger, Itamar; McKenna, Michael J; Formosa, Luke E; Ryan, Michael T; Petersen, Aaron C; Anderson, Mitchell J; Murphy, Robyn M

2017-06-01

Ageing is associated with an upregulation of mitochondrial dynamics proteins mitofusin 2 (Mfn2) and mitochondrial dynamics protein 49 (MiD49) in human skeletal muscle with the increased abundance of Mfn2 being exclusive to type II muscle fibres. These changes occur despite a similar content of mitochondria, as measured by COXIV, NDUFA9 and complexes in their native states (Blue Native PAGE). Following 12 weeks of high-intensity training (HIT), older adults exhibit a robust increase in mitochondria content, while there is a decline in Mfn2 in type II fibres. We propose that the upregulation of Mfn2 and MiD49 with age may be a protective mechanism to protect against mitochondrial dysfunction, in particularly in type II skeletal muscle fibres, and that exercise may have a unique protective effect negating the need for an increased turnover of mitochondria. Mitochondrial dynamics proteins are critical for mitochondrial turnover and maintenance of mitochondrial health. High-intensity interval training (HIT) is a potent training modality shown to upregulate mitochondrial content in young adults but little is known about the effects of HIT on mitochondrial dynamics proteins in older adults. This study investigated the abundance of protein markers for mitochondrial dynamics and mitochondrial content in older adults compared to young adults. It also investigated the adaptability of mitochondria to 12 weeks of HIT in older adults. Both older and younger adults showed a higher abundance of mitochondrial respiratory chain subunits COXIV and NDUFA9 in type I compared with type II fibres, with no difference between the older adults and young groups. In whole muscle homogenates, older adults had higher mitofusin-2 (Mfn2) and mitochondrial dynamics protein 49 (MiD49) contents compared to the young group. Also, older adults had higher levels of Mfn2 in type II fibres compared with young adults. Following HIT in older adults, MiD49 and Mfn2 levels were not different in whole

Socio-cognitive profiles for visual learning in young and older adults

PubMed Central

Christian, Julie; Goldstone, Aimee; Kuai, Shu-Guang; Chin, Wynne; Abrams, Dominic; Kourtzi, Zoe

2015-01-01

It is common wisdom that practice makes perfect; but why do some adults learn better than others? Here, we investigate individuals’ cognitive and social profiles to test which variables account for variability in learning ability across the lifespan. In particular, we focused on visual learning using tasks that test the ability to inhibit distractors and select task-relevant features. We tested the ability of young and older adults to improve through training in the discrimination of visual global forms embedded in a cluttered background. Further, we used a battery of cognitive tasks and psycho-social measures to examine which of these variables predict training-induced improvement in perceptual tasks and may account for individual variability in learning ability. Using partial least squares regression modeling, we show that visual learning is influenced by cognitive (i.e., cognitive inhibition, attention) and social (strategic and deep learning) factors rather than an individual’s age alone. Further, our results show that independent of age, strong learners rely on cognitive factors such as attention, while weaker learners use more general cognitive strategies. Our findings suggest an important role for higher-cognitive circuits involving executive functions that contribute to our ability to improve in perceptual tasks after training across the lifespan. PMID:26113820

Older adults prioritize postural stability in the anterior-posterior direction to regain balance following volitional lateral step.

PubMed

Porter, Shaun; Nantel, Julie

2015-02-01

Postural control in the medial-lateral (ML) direction is of particular interest regarding the assessment of changes in postural control, as it is highly related to the risk of falling. To determine the postural strategies used to regain balance following a voluntary lateral step and compare these strategies between young and older adults. Sixteen older adults (60-90 years) and 14 young adults (20-40 years) were asked to stand quietly for 30s, walk in place and then take a lateral step and stand quietly (30s). Balance Post was divided into 10s intervals. Center of pressure displacement (CoP) and velocity (VCoP) in the anterio-posterior (AP) and ML directions were analyzed. In both groups, CoP and VCoP in AP and ML increased in Post1 compared to Pre (P<0.001). Dissimilar to young adults, VCoP-Post2, Post3 ML were larger than Pre (P=0.01) in older adults. Age correlated with all VCoP (Pre and Post) in both ML (P<0.05) and AP directions (P<0.01). Dissimilar to young adults, older adults use different postural strategies in ML and AP directions and prioritized postural stability in the AP direction to recover balance after completing a lateral step. In the ML direction, older adults took up to 30s to regain balance. Considering that age was related to larger CoP displacement and velocity, the AP strategy to recover postural balance following a lateral step could become less efficient as older adults age and therefore increasing the risk of falls. Copyright © 2015 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.

Sepsis in Older Adults.

PubMed

Rowe, Theresa A; McKoy, June M

2017-12-01

Sepsis disproportionally affects older adults with more than 60% of sepsis diagnoses attributed to adults aged 65 years and older. Identifying, diagnosing, and treating sepsis in older individuals remain a challenge for clinicians, and few studies focus specifically on older adults with multiple medical comorbidities. Principles guiding management of sepsis for older adults are generally the same as in younger adults; however, unique considerations particularly pertinent to the care older adults include antimicrobial selection and dosing, delirium management, and goals of care discussions. Other factors, such as medical comorbidities, cognitive impairment, and functional status, impact outcomes more than age alone. Copyright © 2017 Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.

Relationships between motor unit size and recruitment threshold in older adults: implications for size principle.

PubMed

Fling, Brett W; Knight, Christopher A; Kamen, Gary

2009-08-01

As a part of the aging process, motor unit reorganization occurs in which small motoneurons reinnervate predominantly fast-twitch muscle fibers that have lost their innervation. We examined the relationship between motor unit size and the threshold force for recruitment in two muscles to determine whether older individuals might develop an alternative pattern of motor unit activation. Young and older adults performed isometric contractions ranging from 0 to 50% of maximal voluntary contraction in both the first dorsal interosseous (FDI) and tibialis anterior (TA) muscles. Muscle fiber action potentials were recorded with an intramuscular needle electrode and motor unit size was computed using spike-triggered averaging of the global EMG signal (macro EMG), which was also obtained from the intramuscular needle electrode. As expected, older individuals exhibited larger motor units than young subjects in both the FDI and the TA. However, moderately strong correlations were obtained for the macro EMG amplitude versus recruitment threshold relationship in both the young and older adults within both muscles, suggesting that the size principle of motor unit recruitment seems to be preserved in older adults.

Young adults: vulnerable new targets of tobacco marketing.

PubMed

Biener, Lois; Albers, Alison B

2004-02-01

We examined young adult smoking patterns and receptivity to cigarette advertising to assess vulnerability to tobacco marketing strategies. We obtained data from a telephone survey of 12,072 Massachusetts adults. Smokers aged 18 to 30 years were more likely than older adults to smoke only occasionally and to consume fewer than 10 cigarettes per day. They also were more receptive to cigarette marketing and were more likely to be frequent patrons of bars and clubs. Many young adult smokers are in the initiation phase of smoking and are likely to undergo a transition to either nonsmoking or heavier smoking. If unimpeded by regulation, tobacco promotion in bars and clubs is likely to lead to increased adult smoking prevalence.

Promoting theory of mind in older adults: does age play a role?

PubMed

Rosi, Alessia; Cavallini, Elena; Bottiroli, Sara; Bianco, Federica; Lecce, Serena

2016-01-01

Previous research on age-related changes in Theory of Mind (ToM) showed a decline in older adults, particularly pronounced over 75 years of age. Evidence that ToM may be enhanced in healthy aging people has been demonstrated, but no study has focused on the role of age on the effects of ToM training for elderly people. The present study was designed to examine the efficacy of a ToM training on practiced (ToM Strange Stories) and transfer tasks (ToM Animations) in both young and older adults. The study involved 127 older adults belonging to two age groups: young-old (Mage = 64.41; SD = 2.49; range: 60-69 years) and old-old (Mage = 75.66; SD = 4.38; range: 70-85 years), randomly assigned to either a ToM group or a control group condition. All participants took part in two 2-hour testing sessions and four 2-hour training sessions. Results showed that both young-old and old-old adults in the ToM group condition improved their ability to reason on complex-mental states significantly more than participants in the control group condition. This positive effect of the training was evident on practiced and transfer ToM tasks. Crucially, age did not moderate the effect of the ToM training. These findings demonstrate that young-old and old-old adults equally benefit from the ToM training. Implications for the positive effect of the ToM training in old-old adults are discussed.

Use of memory strategies among younger and older adults: Results from objective and subjective measures.

PubMed

Fabricio, Aline Teixeira; Yassuda, Mônica Sanches

2011-01-01

Memory plays a fundamental role in the identity of people and in human life, as it enables us to interpret our surroundings and make decisions. It is known that the aging process can be accompanied by cognitive decline in some memory sub systems. However, the use of memory strategies can help encoding and retrieval of new information. The aim of this study was to identify and compare, using objective and subjective measures, which recall strategies are used spontaneously by young and older adults. Twenty-six first-year college students, and thirty-three seniors enrolled at the Third Age University of the same campus, completed a visual memory test including 18 black and white pictures, memorized a short story, and completed an open question about memory strategies, a memory check list to indicate strategies used, and a memory self-efficacy scale. The Bousfield categorization measure was also calculated from the recall protocol. Young adults demonstrated better performance than the older adults on the memory tasks, and were also more confident. Both groups reported using similar strategies. Young and older adults seem to tackle memory tasks in similar ways but young adults outperform seniors.

Cognitively active older adults' comprehension and metacomprehension of negated text.

PubMed

Margolin, Sara J

2018-05-14

Background/Study context: Previous research has demonstrated that negated text is universally difficult to understand, and while readers are aware of the difficulty, they are not always able to direct this awareness to improve their comprehension of negation. The present research aimed to determine whether this holds true for older adults, even while maintaining good cognitive function through reading activity. The study used an online paradigm, where young (age range 19-24) and older (age range 60-87) adults read passages, rated their comprehension, and answered questions about what they read. Data analysis included analysis of variance for comprehension accuracy and metacomprehension judgment as well as gamma correlation analysis for the relationship between these two variables to determine accuracy of metacomprehension judgments. . Older readers, who took part in library activities and book discussion groups, had better comprehension than young adults overall and were also better able to judge their own comprehension of negative text. These results suggested that remaining cognitively active may help older adults not only maintain their ability to understand text but may also enhance their ability to assess their own comprehension of that text. In addition, these readers were likely able to use their experience with reading to compensate for any working memory deficits that may occur with age and which may detrimentally affect their ability to understand complex text constructions, such as negation.

Aging, subjective experience, and cognitive control: dramatic false remembering by older adults.

PubMed

Jacoby, Larry L; Bishara, Anthony J; Hessels, Sandra; Toth, Jeffrey P

2005-05-01

Recent research suggests that older adults are more susceptible to interference effects than are young adults; however, that research has failed to equate differences in original learning. In 4 experiments, the authors show that older adults are more susceptible to interference effects produced by a misleading prime. Even when original learning was equated, older adults were 10 times as likely to falsely remember misleading information and were much less likely to increase their accuracy by opting not to answer under conditions of free responding. The results are well described by a multinomial model that postulates multiple modes of cognitive control. According to that model, older adults are likely to be captured by misleading information, a form of goal neglect or deficit in inhibitory functions. Copyright 2005 APA, all rights reserved.

Insufficient Chunk Concatenation May Underlie Changes in Sleep-Dependent Consolidation of Motor Sequence Learning in Older Adults

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Bottary, Ryan; Sonni, Akshata; Wright, David; Spencer, Rebecca M. C.

2016-01-01

Sleep enhances motor sequence learning (MSL) in young adults by concatenating subsequences ("chunks") formed during skill acquisition. To examine whether this process is reduced in aging, we assessed performance changes on the MSL task following overnight sleep or daytime wake in healthy young and older adults. Young adult performance…

Maladaptive and Compulsive Behavior in Prader-Willi Syndrome: New Insights from Older Adults

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Dykens, Elisabeth M.

2004-01-01

Although maladaptive and compulsive behaviors are increasingly well-described in young persons with Prader-Willi syndrome, it is unclear how these problems manifest in older adults with this syndrome. In Part I, I compared maladaptive and compulsive behaviors in 45 older adults with Prader-Willi syndrome (ages 30 to 50 years) to 195 children,…

Compensatory processing during rule-based category learning in older adults.

PubMed

Bharani, Krishna L; Paller, Ken A; Reber, Paul J; Weintraub, Sandra; Yanar, Jorge; Morrison, Robert G

2016-01-01

Healthy older adults typically perform worse than younger adults at rule-based category learning, but better than patients with Alzheimer's or Parkinson's disease. To further investigate aging's effect on rule-based category learning, we monitored event-related potentials (ERPs) while younger and neuropsychologically typical older adults performed a visual category-learning task with a rule-based category structure and trial-by-trial feedback. Using these procedures, we previously identified ERPs sensitive to categorization strategy and accuracy in young participants. In addition, previous studies have demonstrated the importance of neural processing in the prefrontal cortex and the medial temporal lobe for this task. In this study, older adults showed lower accuracy and longer response times than younger adults, but there were two distinct subgroups of older adults. One subgroup showed near-chance performance throughout the procedure, never categorizing accurately. The other subgroup reached asymptotic accuracy that was equivalent to that in younger adults, although they categorized more slowly. These two subgroups were further distinguished via ERPs. Consistent with the compensation theory of cognitive aging, older adults who successfully learned showed larger frontal ERPs when compared with younger adults. Recruitment of prefrontal resources may have improved performance while slowing response times. Additionally, correlations of feedback-locked P300 amplitudes with category-learning accuracy differentiated successful younger and older adults. Overall, the results suggest that the ability to adapt one's behavior in response to feedback during learning varies across older individuals, and that the failure of some to adapt their behavior may reflect inadequate engagement of prefrontal cortex.

Compensatory Processing During Rule-Based Category Learning in Older Adults

PubMed Central

Bharani, Krishna L.; Paller, Ken A.; Reber, Paul J.; Weintraub, Sandra; Yanar, Jorge; Morrison, Robert G.

2016-01-01

Healthy older adults typically perform worse than younger adults at rule-based category learning, but better than patients with Alzheimer's or Parkinson's disease. To further investigate aging's effect on rule-based category learning, we monitored event-related potentials (ERPs) while younger and neuropsychologically typical older adults performed a visual category-learning task with a rule-based category structure and trial-by-trial feedback. Using these procedures, we previously identified ERPs sensitive to categorization strategy and accuracy in young participants. In addition, previous studies have demonstrated the importance of neural processing in the prefrontal cortex and the medial temporal lobe for this task. In this study, older adults showed lower accuracy and longer response times than younger adults, but there were two distinct subgroups of older adults. One subgroup showed near-chance performance throughout the procedure, never categorizing accurately. The other subgroup reached asymptotic accuracy that was equivalent to that in younger adults, although they categorized more slowly. These two subgroups were further distinguished via ERPs. Consistent with the compensation theory of cognitive aging, older adults who successfully learned showed larger frontal ERPs when compared with younger adults. Recruitment of prefrontal resources may have improved performance while slowing response times. Additionally, correlations of feedback-locked P300 amplitudes with category-learning accuracy differentiated successful younger and older adults. Overall, the results suggest that the ability to adapt one's behavior in response to feedback during learning varies across older individuals, and that the failure of some to adapt their behavior may reflect inadequate engagement of prefrontal cortex. PMID:26422522

Social welfare utilization and needs of older adults in Taiwan: survey research.

PubMed

Hsieh, Hsiu-Fen; Chen, Kuei-Min; Lin, Mei-Hui; Wang, Yueh-Chin; Huang, Hsin-Ting

2014-01-01

The demand for long-term care for older adults has escalated sharply. A good policy dedicated to the welfare of older adults has improved their quality of life. The purpose of this study was to explore the social welfare utilization and needs of older adults and compare their differences among age groups, genders, and functional dependency levels. Three hundred eighty-four stratified, random-sampled Taiwanese community-dwelling older adults were recruited for this survey research. Participants rated their utilization of and needs for the 30 social welfare services provided by the government on a Likert-type scale. The most widely used and needed social welfare services by the older adults were senior monetary stipend and a subsidy for the national health insurance premium. Young-old, male, and functionally independent older adults had more knowledge of the social welfare services than their counterparts. While designing a comprehensive social welfare system, differing needs of different age groups, genders, and functional dependency levels should be taken into consideration. Copyright © 2014 Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.

Working memory training and transfer in older adults.

PubMed

Richmond, Lauren L; Morrison, Alexandra B; Chein, Jason M; Olson, Ingrid R

2011-12-01

There has been a great deal of interest, both privately and commercially, in using working memory training exercises to improve general cognitive function. However, many of the laboratory findings for older adults, a group in which this training is of utmost interest, are discouraging due to the lack of transfer to other tasks and skills. Importantly, improvements in everyday functioning remain largely unexamined in relation to WM training. We trained working memory in older adults using a task that encourages transfer in young adults (Chein & Morrison, 2010). We tested transfer to measures of working memory (e.g., Reading Span), everyday cognitive functioning [the Test of Everyday Attention (TEA) and the California Verbal Learning Test (CVLT)], and other tasks of interest. Relative to controls, trained participants showed transfer improvements in Reading Span and the number of repetitions on the CVLT. Training group participants were also significantly more likely to self-report improvements in everyday attention. Our findings support the use of ecological tasks as a measure of transfer in an older adult population.

Unpacking Sleep and Suicide in Older Adults in a Combined Online Sample.

PubMed

Golding, Shea; Nadorff, Michael R; Winer, E Samuel; Ward, Kathryn Claire

2015-12-15

Duration of insomnia symptoms and nightmares are related to suicidal risk in young adults independent of current symptoms of insomnia, nightmares, anxiety, depression, and PTSD. However, this relation has yet to be examined among older adults, despite older adults being at higher risk of suicidal behavior. Further, the current study aims to replicate previous research among younger adults showing that insomnia symptoms and nightmares are associated with suicide risk independent of the interpersonal psychological theory of suicide (IPTS). The present study utilized 167 participants age 55 and older obtained by combining two independent mTurk data collections of adults in the United States. In the current sample, duration of nightmares was associated with suicide risk in older adults independent of symptoms of current insomnia and nightmares, duration of insomnia, and symptoms of PTSD, anhedonia, and the IPTS. Our findings suggest that the duration of nightmares (i.e., how long someone has been experiencing nightmares) predict substantial variance in suicide risk among older adults in addition to the risk factors typically examined. Thus, assessment of sleep dysfunction is important when assessing suicide risk among older adults. © 2015 American Academy of Sleep Medicine.

Age-related self-overestimation of step-over ability in healthy older adults and its relationship to fall risk

PubMed Central

2013-01-01

Background Older adults could not safely step over an obstacle unless they correctly estimated their physical ability to be capable of a successful step over action. Thus, incorrect estimation (overestimation) of ability to step over an obstacle could result in severe accident such as falls in older adults. We investigated whether older adults tended to overestimate step-over ability compared with young adults and whether such overestimation in stepping over obstacles was associated with falls. Methods Three groups of adults, young-old (age, 60–74 years; n, 343), old-old (age, >74 years; n, 151), and young (age, 18–35 years; n, 71), performed our original step-over test (SOT). In the SOT, participants observed a horizontal bar at a 7-m distance and estimated the maximum height (EH) that they could step over. After estimation, they performed real SOT trials to measure the actual maximum height (AH). We also identified participants who had experienced falls in the 1 year period before the study. Results Thirty-nine young-old adults (11.4%) and 49 old-old adults (32.5%) failed to step over the bar at EH (overestimation), whereas all young adults succeeded (underestimation). There was a significant negative correlation between actual performance (AH) and self-estimation error (difference between EH and AH) in the older adults, indicating that older adults with lower AH (SOT ability) tended to overestimate actual ability (EH > AH) and vice versa. Furthermore, the percentage of participants who overestimated SOT ability in the fallers (28%) was almost double larger than that in the non-fallers (16%), with the fallers showing significantly lower SOT ability than the non-fallers. Conclusions Older adults appear unaware of age-related physical decline and tended to overestimate step-over ability. Both age-related decline in step-over ability, and more importantly, overestimation or decreased underestimation of this ability may raise potential risk of falls. PMID

Task Inhibition and Response Inhibition in Older vs. Younger Adults: A Diffusion Model Analysis

PubMed Central

Schuch, Stefanie

2016-01-01

Differences in inhibitory ability between older (64–79 years, N = 24) and younger adults (18–26 years, N = 24) were investigated using a diffusion model analysis. Participants performed a task-switching paradigm that allows assessing n−2 task repetition costs, reflecting inhibitory control on the level of tasks, as well as n−1 response-repetition costs, reflecting inhibitory control on the level of responses. N−2 task repetition costs were of similar size in both age groups. Diffusion model analysis revealed that for both younger and older adults, drift rate parameters were smaller in the inhibition condition relative to the control condition, consistent with the idea that persisting task inhibition slows down response selection. Moreover, there was preliminary evidence for task inhibition effects in threshold separation and non-decision time in the older, but not the younger adults, suggesting that older adults might apply different strategies when dealing with persisting task inhibition. N−1 response-repetition costs in mean RT were larger in older than younger adults, but in mean error rates tended to be larger in younger than older adults. Diffusion-model analysis revealed longer non-decision times in response repetitions than response switches in both age groups, consistent with the idea that motor processes take longer in response repetitions than response switches due to persisting response inhibition of a previously executed response. The data also revealed age-related differences in overall performance: Older adults responded more slowly and more accurately than young adults, which was reflected by a higher threshold separation parameter in diffusion model analysis. Moreover, older adults showed larger non-decision times and higher variability in non-decision time than young adults, possibly reflecting slower and more variable motor processes. In contrast, overall drift rate did not differ between older and younger adults. Taken together

Visual Object Pattern Separation Varies in Older Adults

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Holden, Heather M.; Toner, Chelsea; Pirogovsky, Eva; Kirwan, C. Brock; Gilbert, Paul E.

2013-01-01

Young and nondemented older adults completed a visual object continuous recognition memory task in which some stimuli (lures) were similar but not identical to previously presented objects. The lures were hypothesized to result in increased interference and increased pattern separation demand. To examine variability in object pattern separation…

Museums and Older Adults .