C H A P T E R 5

COGNITIVE CHANGES WITH AGING

INTELLIGENCE AND AGING

•Intelligence •the theoretical limit of

an individual’s

performance

•Intelligence Quotient (IQ) •an individual’s relative

abilities in making

judgments, in

comprehension, and in

reasoning

AGE-RELATED CHANGES IN INTELLIGENCE

•Peak performance varies by test

•Performance on timed tests

declines

•Performance on non-timed test

remains stable until the 80s

•Rarely decline in all five primary

mental abilities (PMA)

•High scorers continue to do well

even among oldest-old

•Declines in tests of fluid

intelligence begin earlier than in

crystallized intelligence

PROBLEMS IN THE MEASUREMENT OF

COGNITIVE FUNCTION

•Many studies are cross-sectional design not longitudinal approaches

•Historical factors may have greater effect on intelligence scores than age

per se

•Attrition-subject and selective

FACTORS THAT MAY INFLUENCE INTELLIGENCE IN

ADULTHOOD

•Biological/Structural changes in the brain

•Educational attainment

•Involvement in complex work

•Cardiovascular disease

•Hypertension

•Sensory deficits

•Occupational level

•Nutritional deficiencies

THE PROCESS OF LEARNING AND MEMORY

•Learning •Process by which new information is

encoded

•Memory •Secondary (long-term) memory

•permanent memory store

•Ionic and echoic memory

•Primary (working) memory

•Temporary stage of holding

information

THE INFORMATION PROCESSING MODEL

•Information Processing Model

•conceptual model of how

learning and memory take place

•Aging appears to reduce

efficiency of processing

information.

•Aging does not influence storage

capacity of memory.

TYPES OF MEMORY

•Episodic Memory

•Explicit Memory

•Flashbulb Memory

•Source Memory

•Procedural Memory

•Semantic Memory

•Implicit Memory

FACTORS AFFECTING LEARNING IN OLD AGE

•The Importance of Attention •Selective attention

•being able to focus on relevant information while ignoring

irrelevant information

•Sustained attention

•keeping alert to focus on a specific stimulus over time

•Attentional control

•ability to allocate attention among multiple stimuli

simultaneously

AGE-RELATED CHANGES IN MEMORY

•Types of retrieval •Recall and Recognition

•Explanations of older adults’ difficulties

with retrieving information

•Disuse theory

•the view that memory fades or

is lost because one fails to use

the information

•Interference theory

•the view that memory fades or

is lost because of distractions

experienced during learning

AGE-RELATED CHANGES IN MEMORY

•Tip-of-the-Tongue States (TOTs) •difficulty retrieving names from secondary

memory but often spontaneously recalled

later

•Explanations of the increase of TOTs •Decrement model

•Incremental knowledge gain

IMPROVING COGNITIVE ABILITIES IN OLD AGE

•Cognitive Retraining •teaching research participants how to

use techniques to keep minds active and

maintain good memory skills

•Memory Mediators •visual and verbal links between

information to be memorized and

information that is already in secondary

memory

WISDOM AND CREATIVITY

• Wisdom

• Criteria of wise behavior

• Factual knowledge

• Procedural knowledge

• Lifespan contextualism

• Value relativism

• Managing uncertainty

• Creativity

• Ability to apply unique and

feasible solutions to new

situations

• Measure of creativity

• Divergent thinking