Impaired Attentional Disengagement in Older Adults With Useful Field of View Decline

Typical measures of the useful field of view (UFOV) involve many components of attention. The objective of the current research was to examine the attentional operations that might underlie declines in the UFOV. We used 2 basic attention tasks to characterize the profile of visual attention in UFOV-...

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Bibliographic Details
Published in:The journals of gerontology. Series B, Psychological sciences and social sciences Psychological sciences and social sciences, 2012-07, Vol.67 (4), p.405-412
Main Authors: COSMAN, Joshua D, LEES, Monica N, LEE, John D, RIZZO, Matthew, VECERA, Shaun P
Format: Article
Language:English
Subjects:
Adult. Elderly
Aged
Aged, 80 and over
Ageing
Aging
Aging - physiology
Aging - psychology
Attention - physiology
Attitudes
Biological and medical sciences
Developmental psychology
Disengagement
Elderly people
Female
Fundamental and applied biological sciences. Psychology
Humans
Male
Neuropsychological Tests
Older people
Psychology. Psychoanalysis. Psychiatry
Psychology. Psychophysiology
Safety
Space Perception - physiology
The Journals of Gerontology, Series B: Psychological Sciences and Social Sciences
Vision Disorders - etiology
Vision Disorders - psychology
Visual attention
Visual Fields - physiology
Visual Perception - physiology
Visual task performance
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Summary:Typical measures of the useful field of view (UFOV) involve many components of attention. The objective of the current research was to examine the attentional operations that might underlie declines in the UFOV. We used 2 basic attention tasks to characterize the profile of visual attention in UFOV-impaired and -unimpaired observers. Our results suggested that declines in the UFOV result from a deficit in attentional disengagement, not a decrease in attentional breadth or scope. The results suggested that UFOV decline in normal aging can be associated with a specific attentional operation, namely attentional disengagement. These results suggest that the underlying cause of UFOV decline may not be a restriction in the breadth or scope of attention. Because the UFOV is a reliable predictor of driving safety, our results point to attentional components that are critical for the visual behavior of older adults.
ISSN:1079-5014
1758-5368
DOI:10.1093/geronb/gbr116