Abstract
This study was conducted to investigate the hypothesis that the decline in memory consolidation in aging may be determined by the reduction of inhibitory control processes. To this end an Attentional Blink (AB) paradigm was employed. AB effect was more pronounced and lengthened for older adults (60–85 years) than young (18–22 years) and middle aged (45–55 years) groups, which could be due to interference at the perceptual stage itself. The onset of the first target involuntarily captures attentional resources, impairing subsequent target identification due to decrease in inhibitory control. Experiment 2 was conducted manipulating perceptual load in working memory to study interference as a function of load. The effect of load was more pronounced for older and middle-aged adults. The decline in memory consolidation in this group may be due to difficulties in early stages of perceptual processing, inhibitory control and unsuccessful suppression of irrelevant stimuli. These effects were also observed among middle-aged individuals.
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