2011 — 2012 |
Bailey, Heather |
F32Activity Code Description: To provide postdoctoral research training to individuals to broaden their scientific background and extend their potential for research in specified health-related areas. |
Situation Model Updating in Young and Older Adults
DESCRIPTION (provided by applicant): The subjective memory complaints reported by older adults involve memory for everyday activities, such as forgetting where they placed items, forgetting directions to familiar locations, and repeating stories. Yet, age-related changes in memory in the context of naturalistic everyday events have gone surprisingly unstudied. Recently, we have begun to understand how people build and update representations of events they experience or read about. Activity is dynamic, so the representation of "what is happening now" (i.e., situation model) must be updated constantly. Decreased memory updating and capacity are associated with aging;thus, older adults may update situation models differently than do young adults. Situation models are updated when a change has occurred along at least one of several dimensions, including characters, goals, space, and time. One possibility is that all situation model updating is incremental in which only information relevant to the changing dimension is updated. Alternatively, situation models may be globally updated. In this view, dynamic activity is segmented into discrete events that are represented in the situation model. Activity is segmented at an event boundary, and when a new event begins, the entire model is updated-not just the information that changed. Given that little evidence exists for global updating, this project aims to test whether (1) situation models are updated globally and (2) the updating process is affected by age. To assess these aims, young and older adults will read narrative texts. Memory will be probed following an event boundary triggered by a change along one dimension (e.g., space). If we find evidence of global updating, then all information related to the previous event will be less available after an event boundary. However, if updating is incremental, then we should find that only information associated with the changed dimension is less available. Finally, while participants read narratives, functional magnetic imaging will be used to look at age-related differences in phasic activity in response to memory probes. If situation models are updated globally at event boundaries, then all probes should selectively activate the medial temporal lobes-regions associated with retrieval from long-term memory. If situation models are updated incrementally, then the changed-dimension probes should activate the medial temporal lobes, whereas the unchanged-dimension probes should activate prefrontal cortex-region associated with retrieval from a situation model. This project has implications for theories of comprehension as well as cognitive aging interventions. PUBLIC HEALTH RELEVANCE: Declines in memory for everyday events are one of the common complaints of aging. Recent research with younger adults suggests that "chunking" ongoing activity into meaningful events is important for later memory. The proposed studies will investigate how the mind and brain do this chunking as people read text and how this process changes with age.
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0.948 |
2017 — 2021 |
Bailey, Heather |
P20Activity Code Description: To support planning for new programs, expansion or modification of existing resources, and feasibility studies to explore various approaches to the development of interdisciplinary programs that offer potential solutions to problems of special significance to the mission of the NIH. These exploratory studies may lead to specialized or comprehensive centers. |
Plasticity in Aging and Memory For Everyday Activities @ Kansas State University
PROJECT SUMMARY As we age, cognitive abilities such as working memory and episodic memory decline, but semantic knowledge remains intact. This proposal will test whether older adults can leverage their intact semantic knowledge to offset the declines in working memory and episodic memory. In particular, the proposed studies will assess whether semantic knowledge improves how everyday activities are encoded. The long-term goal of this research is to identify ways in which older adults can use their intact knowledge to improve their everyday memory, make effective decisions in everyday life (e.g., decisions about healthcare and estate planning), interact with new technology, and maintain an independent lifestyle. This goal is highly relevant to the NIH core mission ?to seek fundamental knowledge about the nature and behavior of living systems and the application of that knowledge to enhance health, lengthen life, and reduce illness and disability.? Aim 1 of this proposal will determine how knowledge use during event encoding changes with age. Aim 2 will test a knowledge-based intervention for improving everyday memory. The proposal will use an innovative combination of behavioral oculomotor, and neuroimaging measures of event encoding to address these aims. We will assess how younger and older adults adapt their strategies when learning new information. Specifically, this project will focus on the extent to which people can learn to utilize their existing knowledge to effectively encode everyday activities. We hypothesize that semantic knowledge will improve event encoding. Further, we predict that because older adults often experience everyday memory failures, they will learn to rely on their increased knowledge base to offset these impairments. Thus, we predict that knowledge will improve everyday memory to a greater extent for older adults. Our goal of improving older adults' ability to encode and retrieve everyday activities is aligned with NIA's vision for older adults to ?enjoy robust health and independence, remain physically and mentally active, and continue to make positive contributions to their families and communities.?
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