Age-Related Effects of Stimulus-Specific Context on Perceptual Learning

Abstract

The focus of the present study was the investigation of age-related differences in perceptual learning under conditions of consistent mapping (CM), varied mapping (VM), and context-specific training. Context-specific training involved conditions where specific target and distractor sets were paired consistently within a condition but were inconsistent across conditions. Eight young (mean age 25) and eight old (mean age 67) subjects participated for 8000 trials of training and 3200 trials of various transfer conditions. The transfer conditions were designed to ascertain the extent to which the subjects had automatized their performance in each of the training conditions. The training results yielded significant differences between young and old adults only under CM training. Performance in the context conditions for young adults mimicked that of the old subjects in the CM condition. The training results suggest that manipulations which disrupt the development of attention-calling strength of stimuli lead to equivalent performance for young and old adults. The transfer results provide similar information. It is proposed that the ability to “strengthen” target information is disrupted in older adults. Based on our previous and the present findings, processing principles are presented which outline important differential considerations for training young and/or older adults.