Aging Final

Deals with solving novel problems.

Fluid intelligence

Stuff that we remember throughout our lives

Crystalized intelligence

Crystalized intelligence is often influenced by?

Culture and education

What were the results with C and F intelligence in Park 2002

Fluid decreased with crysalized increased

Characteristics of age related changes in processing speed are how prevalent?

There ubituqous, or its everywhere

Age related changes in processing speed shows a general?

uniform slowing model

In relation to other cognitive declines,

Changes in processing speed changes with cognitive declines.

Overall, processing speed is?

Faster in earlier life, and becomes longer as we age. It is the same across genders on the same reaction time task.

If you know both the older adults and younger adults performance dealing with reaction times you can?

If you know the younger persons performance, you can look at the older with a correlation of .95.

Domain-specific slowing has shown?

That verbal rt's slow less compared to spatial RT's which slows more.

What was the difference between verbal and spatial?

Verabl was -1.5 slower and spatial was 2 times slower

Processing was better able to predict for this group because of?

Professors because of their background

It was harder for the standard group because?

Of their differing backgrounds

However, professors are not immune to?

Cognitive slowing

Older adults perform fewer ____ in the same amount of time as young adults.

Operations, which affects the quality and accurarcy of later processing.

Older adults have have decreased availability of _____ info from earlier processing, due to?

Relevant, rapid decay or displacement

The dedifferentation hypothesis states? It also causes?

The myelin begins to break down.

Different systems become less specialized therefore less differentiated. Amount of activation for systems becomes lower as a result.

Recruits other parts of the brain to help out compenstate loss functions.

The compensation hypothesis

When other systems are less capable of doing tasks, other systems have to compensate. When multiple parts of the brain are needed to complete the task, it takes longer.

Short term memory is also called what two things?

Working and primary memory

How does one assess primary memory?

Looking at how individuals retain a brief period of info in a short amount of time.

holds info but is not retained

working memory

information is processed as it is temporarily stored so it can be processed for a long term memory. Information is repeated so it can be remembered

digit span task

digits are repeated back. Repeat back two digits, then three etc. until fail.

digit span = max amount of digits repeated. People in their 20s have an easier time with the task and then decreases with age. Both are affected by age equally.

age related change in STM

decreased processing speed

The sound of the statement in the short term memory (phonological store). When you repeat it (articulatory rehearsal) it goes into working/long term memory. It is only empirically supported that that articulatory rehearsal changes with age (Baddeley's phonological system)

Multhaup 1996

speech rate and age correlate granted memory span increases (positive)

everyone has same store but articulatory rehearsal varies

Regarding to older adults overall reading span, what happens?

If you dont burden older adults then their is no problem, but if you do the inhibition problem occurs.

What are two parts of LTM?

Semantic and episodic

The storage of general knowledge of the world.

Semanatic memory. Not as affected by age.

Whats the difference between recognition and recall?

Overall recognition is less affected by age vs. recall. Older adults experience more "tip of the tongue phenomena"

What about tip of the tongue?

Were able to remember things better after 50 seconds because the memory is finally remembered

Memory for specific autobiographical memories.

Episodic memory

What did Spencer and Raz find in their meta analysis on episodic memory?

Age related declines in episodic memory affect context memory more than content memory.

meta analysis of 46 studies

Older adults may be mistaken in their impression of generally preserved?

Remote memories or memories from long ago

Cohen et al studied?

peoples recall of their personal circumstances

What were the results for the difference between young and older in Cohen?

Young adults were 90% accurate on what they remembered compared to 42% for older

tested 22 and 72 y/o at 10-14 days after original news and a year later

Long term memory is also composed of?

Implicit and explicit memory

Which is more affected?

Explicit more affected by age compared to implicit

main findings of implicit and explicit memories

-a dissociation occurs between implicit and explicit memories
-older adults are equally able to perform implicit memory tasks compared to younger adults. Younger adults are more able to perform explicit memory tasks.

conscious retrieval of memories

Explicit memory

as revealed by enhanced performance on a task as a result of an earlier encounter with a stimulus

Implcit memory

tested using word stems and word fragments

refers to memory of people, words, and events encountered or experienced in the past.

Retrospective memory

Remembering at a the apropriate point in the future that something has to be done with any prompting in the form of instruction to recall.

Prospective memory

Maylor et al. 1990 (prospective memory studies)

Do something when a certain time comes (prospective memory) e.g. take pills before bed. Sense of responsibility can improve results

Laboratory studies often showed?

Mixed results with some studies finding differences and some not.

utilized time based and event based tasks

What was the difference between time-based and event-based?

Performed worse on time based tasks

What is invovled in everyday competence?

Ability to do things day to day and solve subsequent issues that may arise

legal definition of competence

Incapacity or impairment of ability to legally make their own decisions. I.e. cannot sign own documents, make own medical decisions etc.

How is every day competence assessed?

1. ability to take care of self
2. ability to manage affairs and property

looks at instrumental activities of daily living

What are factors that impact every day competence?

-Cognitive abilities
-health
-social support
-personality

Cognitive abilties?

Provide 50% of the variance in everyday competence

This is important in social support.

Both receiving and providing it. must be a match between receiver and provider in settings outside immediate social network

how is everyday competence maintained

via social supports

Ball et al. 2002

participants were trained in 10 sessions on either speed, memory, and reasoning.

All factors decline after age 20.

training improved what they were trained on but not the things they weren't showing it does not transfer

What about crossword puzzles?

-vocab increases in groups that did more puzzles.
-does not affect reasoning regardless of time spent on puzzles.

amount of cognitively stimulating activities engaged

type of knowledge varies based on activity but still showed a pattern of fluid intelligence declined.

Its not the amount of cognitive simulation, but the?

Overall desire for cognitive simulation

does not affect pattern of aging but people who seek out more will have less risk factors for dementia

training on everyday function

training works to improve performance, but effects are not transferred. Varieties in tasks help to maintain cognitive function.

What did Resnick et al find about 92 non-demented old adults?

Overall their brain volume got smaller, while ventricle volume increased.

In the study of brain regions and their volume af healthy adults, what was found?

Older age led to smaller volume overall, only some parts of the brain thought not uniform some are more than others. Bigger picture is volume essentially consistant through aging.

Regarding to the differences between some medical and healthy, what were the results?

in controlled medical conditions there is still an increase in ventricles

can neurons generate?

Yes, but only in the olfactory bulb and hippocampus

stm memory issues can occur here if there is damage

cell proliferation experiment

running and enrichment could double the number of surviving new cells in the dentate gyrus

highest level of proliferation occurred in running group

Depression can decrease?

Levels of serotonin

stress hormones inhibit neurogenesis preventing neuron production

After three weeks of anti-depression treatment, what occured?

A 70% increase in neurogenesis

This has also shown to increase neurogenesis.

electroconvulsive shock therapy

What are two reasons for brain activations involved in cognitive tasks changing?

There are more bilaterial activations in the brain, and increases in prefrontal activation

How many hempispheres are better as we age?

Two due to compensatory recruitment

The ability to produce original and meaninful responses that are appropraite in context and valued by others

Creativity

Type of thinking that deals with coming up with a variety of solutions to a problem/

Divergent

One correct answer to a problem

Convergent

sternbergs definition of creativity

a decision specifically ability and willingness to defy the crowd, oneself, and zeitgeist

What are three ways to measure creativity?

Word assocaition tests, a test of alternative uses, fable tests and make up problems test

What is the correlation between general intelligence and creativity?

.20

examples of creativity from sternbergs lab

• Design a scientific experiment on a topic of your choice.
• Draw a picture of the beginning of time.
• Suppose the Nazis had won WWII, what would the world be like today?
• Write a creative story using the title "Social media died today".
• Draw an advertisement of a new brand of bowtie.
• Create an exciting slogan for your school.
• Create a new game.

highly creative people and intelligence levels

minimum of intelligence is required to score highly creative (requires high iq)

creativity in above average intellegence

average is 100 pts, correlation is observed in average people but not above average

cognitive characteristics of creative people

-think in terms of analogies
-make loose associations
-engage in divergent thinking
-great cognitive flexibility
-keep options open
-do not make snap decisions about the likely outcome or effort
-good at seeing a problem form a new vantage point

Personal Characteristics of creative people

independent non-conformist unconventional
have wide interests
motivated and persistent
greater openness to experiences
more risk taking
the most creative people had intermediate amounts of formal education
certain mental disorders may promote creativity (manic phases) but some researchers have suggested that mental illness is independent of creativity (simiton 1984,1977)

decline model of creativity

creativity reaches a peak in young adulthood and declines thereafter throughout adulthood

Lehman looked at?

Analysis of productivity of historial figures

Productivity peaks?

In early life, lasts 10 years

What were some cirticisims?

Using producivity is flawed, not all creative people are productive. Instead of using total producitivty use effective producitivity. Longeviity was also a concern, because at the time of the of the study during the 50's, not many people made it to old age.

More recent work has shown?

That during our 30's and first career we are the most creative.

As we age, it was found that we become?

Less creative overall

creativity and career age

found that nobel prize winners were the most creative at chronological age 20-30 and within the first 10 years of their career

verbal and non verbal creativity

when assessed in fluency, flexibility, and originality young adults performed significantly better than middle and older adults.

men tended to perform better than women and everyone performed better in a relaxed setting

Palmiero looked at?

Speed and fluid intelligence

what do empirical studies conclude about creativity

verbal divergent thinking decreases faster than visual

alternative interpretations can be seen in older people who may be more stressed than young adults

creativity does not equate divergent thinking

Regarding the continuity model, earlier work by Galton looked at the association between?

Eugenics, smart people should mate to increase smart people in the population pool.

What were the problems with Galton's work?

Had no clear definition of creativity, had a strong hereditary bias and believed IQ=creativity

However, in recent work?

Senior scholars have been found to work up to 80 years old, and highly creative architects (70)% of them still working, and 60% work full time.

Non-speciailzied aging populations?

Also show new creativity in the old.

Decline or continuity?

Can go both ways, depends on the individual.

When it came to aging artistits, what was found?

That as we age, we have more time, knowledge, and skills to put into our work often increasing quality and quantity of work.

What are four themes reflected in the models?

Continuity, compensation, integration, and motivations.

Believed that wisdom was the the highest of human things

Plato

wisdom is

the capstone of knowledge

Happy is the man who found wisdom

Old testament

Ability to know things and solve problems others cannot

Secular terms

Proverbs, masterful solution of a problem

Every day beliefs and manifestations of wisdom

Integrated whole of perfection: cognitive, affective, and interpsonal domains of consciouness

Eastern beliefs