Age and temporal resolution in color vision: When do red and green make yellow?

Abstract

The ability to temporally resolve color stimuli was compared in young and old adults. Stimuli consisted of pairs of brief green and red flashes separated by six levels of interstimulus interval and presented at two different luminance levels. Integration of the color pairs to produce reports of yellow decreased significantly with increasing interstimulus interval, particularly for the younger group. This difference remained when the age-related loss in retinal illumination was compensated by increased stimulus luminance. These data indicate a decline with age in temporal resolution in color vision. Further, they suggest that age differences in temporal resolution can be more appropriately attributed to age-related differences in visual/neural mechanisms than to changes in the ocular media or photoreceptor activity.