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Distraction Can Reduce Age-Related Forgetting

In three experiments, we assessed whether older adults' generally greater tendency to process distracting information can be used to minimize widely reported age-related differences in forgetting. Younger and older adults studied and recalled a list of words on an initial test and again on a su...

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Bibliographic Details
Published in:Psychological science 2013-04, Vol.24 (4), p.448-455
Main Authors: Biss, Renée K., Ngo, K. W. Joan, Hasher, Lynn, Campbell, Karen L., Rowe, Gillian
Format: Article
Language:English
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Summary:In three experiments, we assessed whether older adults' generally greater tendency to process distracting information can be used to minimize widely reported age-related differences in forgetting. Younger and older adults studied and recalled a list of words on an initial test and again on a surprise test after a 15-min delay. In the middle (Experiments 1a and 2) or at the end (Experiment 3) of the delay, participants completed a 1-back task in which half of the studied words appeared as distractors. Across all experiments, older adults reliably forgot unrepeated words; however, older adults rarely or never forgot the words that had appeared as distractors, whereas younger adults forgot words in both categories. Exposure to distraction may serve as a rehearsal episode for older adults, and thus as a method by which general distractibility may be co-opted to boost memory.
ISSN:0956-7976
1467-9280
DOI:10.1177/0956797612457386