Prefrontal cortex and age-related changes in strategic processing

Abstract

Event Abstract Back to Event Prefrontal cortex and age-related changes in strategic processing Brenda Kirchhoff1* 1 University of Missouri – St. Louis , United States Episodic memory impairments are one of the main cognitive changes associated with healthy and disordered aging. For example, healthy older adults typically remember fewer words following intentional encoding than young adults. Under-and over-recruitment of prefrontal cortex have also been reported during intentional encoding in older adults. There is growing evidence that changes in self-initiated encoding strategy use could play an important role in these age-related memory impairments and alterations in brain activity. Behavioral studies have suggested that older adults are less likely than young adults to spontaneously use effective encoding strategies during intentional encoding. In addition, age-related changes in brain activity during intentional encoding have been reported in prefrontal regions associated with self-initiated use of effective encoding strategies in young adults. To further explore the role that age-related changes in self-initiated encoding strategy use may play in age-related changes in brain activity in prefrontal cortex, we recently conducted a cognitive training study in which older adults were taught to use semantic encoding strategies. Strategy use training substantially improved older adults’ ability to consciously recollect studied words. Older adults reported greater self-initiated use of semantic encoding strategies following cognitive training, and were less likely to report not using any learning strategy. Brain activity in left inferior prefrontal regions increased following cognitive training, and individual differences in training-related changes in brain activity in these regions were associated with individual differences in training-related changes in memory performance.