Multitasking and aging: Do older adults benefit from performing a highly practiced task?

Experimental Aging Research

Volumn 40, Issue 3, 2014, Pages 280-307

  Allen, Philip A ^a   Lien, Mei Ching ^b   Ruthruff, Eric ^c   Voss, Andreas ^d  

^a UNIVERSITY OF AKRON   (United States)

^b OREGON STATE UNIVERSITY   (United States)

^c UNIVERSITY OF NEW MEXICO   (United States)

^d UNIVERSITY OF HEIDELBERG   (Germany)

Author keywords

[No Author keywords available]

Indexed keywords

ADOLESCENT; ADULT; AGED; AGING; ATTENTION; CONTROLLED STUDY; FEMALE; FOLLOW UP; HUMAN; MALE; MIDDLE AGED; PHYSIOLOGY; PSYCHOLOGICAL REFRACTORY PERIOD; PSYCHOLOGY; PSYCHOMOTOR PERFORMANCE; RANDOMIZED CONTROLLED TRIAL; TASK PERFORMANCE; VERY ELDERLY; YOUNG ADULT;

ADOLESCENT; ADULT; AGED; AGED, 80 AND OVER; AGING; ATTENTION; FEMALE; FOLLOW-UP STUDIES; HUMANS; MALE; MIDDLE AGED; PSYCHOMOTOR PERFORMANCE; REFRACTORY PERIOD, PSYCHOLOGICAL; TASK PERFORMANCE AND ANALYSIS; YOUNG ADULT;

EID: 84899825640     PISSN: 0361073X     EISSN: 10964657     Source Type: Journal    
DOI: 10.1080/0361073X.2014.896663     Document Type: Article

References (40)

1. Allen, P. A. (1990). Influence of processing variability on adult age differences in memory distribution of order information. Cognitive Development, 5, 177-192.
2. Allen, P. A., Lien, M-C., Murphy, M. D., Sanders, R. E., Judge, K., & McCann, R. (2002). Age differences in overlapping-Task performance: Evidence for efficient parallel processing in older adults. Psychology and Aging, 17, 505-519.
3. Allen, P. A., Murphy, M. D., Kaufman, M., Groth, K. E., & Begovic, A. (2004). Age differences in central (semantic) and peripheral processing: The importance of considering both response times and errors. Journal of Gerontology: Psychological Sciences, 59B, P210-P219.
4. Allen, P. A., Ruthruff, E., Elicker, J. D., & Lien, M.-C. (2009). Multi-session dualtask PRP practice benefits older and younger adults equally. Experimental Aging Research, 35, 369-399.
5. Allen, P. A., Smith, A. F., Vires-Collins, H., & Sperry, S. (1998). The psychological refractory period: Evidence for age differences in attentional time-sharing. Psychology and Aging, 13, 218-229.
6. Bherer, L., Kramer, A. F., Peterson, M. S., Colcombe, S., Erikson, K., & Becic, E. (2005). Training effects on dual-Task performance: Are there age-related differences in plasticity of attentional control? Psychology and Aging, 20, 695-709.
7. Bherer, L., Kramer, A. F., Peterson, M. S., Colcombe, S., Erikson, K., & Becic, E. (2006). Testing the limits of cognitive plasticity in older adults: Application to attentional control. Acta Psychologica, 123, 261-278.
8. Gothe, K., Oberaurer, K., & Kliegl, R. (2007). Age differences in dual-Task performance after practice. Psychology and Aging, 22, 596-606.
9. Hartley, A. A., Maquestiaux, F., & Butts, N. S. (2011). A demonstration of dual-Task performance without interference in some older adults. Psychology and Aging, 26, 181-187.
10. Hommel, B. (1998). Automatic stimulus-response translation in dual-Task performance. Journal of Experimental Psychology: Human Perception and Performance, 24, 1368-1384.
11. Kramer, A. F., Larish, J. F., & Strayer, D. L. (1995). Training for attentional control for dual-Task settings: A comparison of young and old adults. Journal of Experimental Psychology: Applied, 1, 50-76.
12. Kramer, A. F., Larish, J. F.,Weber, T. A., & Bardell, L. (1999). Training for executive control. In D. Gopher & A. Koriat (Eds), Attention and performance (Vol. XVII, pp. 617-652). Cambridge, MA: MIT Press.
13. Lien, M.-C., Allen, P. A., Ruthruff, E., Grabbe, J., McCann, R. S., & Remington, R. W. (2006). Visual word recognition without central attention: Evidence for greater automaticity with advancing age. Psychology and Aging, 21, 431-447.
14. Maquestiaux, F., Lagué-Beauvais, M., Ruthruff, E., & Bherer, L. (2008). Bypassing the central bottleneck after single-Task practice in the psychological refractory period paradigm: Evidence for task automatization and greedy resource recruitment. Memory & Cognition, 36, 1262-1282.
15. Maquestiaux, F., Hartley, A., & Bertsch, J. (2004). Can practice overcome agerelated differences in the psychological refractory period effect? Psychology and Aging, 19, 649-667.
16. Maquestiaux, F., Lague-Beauvais, M., Ruthruff, E., Hartley, A. A., & Bherer, L. (2010). Learning to bypass the central bottleneck: Declining automaticity with advancing age. Psychology and Aging, 25, 177-192.
17. Meyer, D. E., & Kieras, D. E. (1997). A computational theory of executive cognitive processes and multiple-Task performance: Part 2 Accounts of psychological refractory-period phenomena. Psychological Review, 104, 749-791.
18. Neider, M. B., Gaspar, J. G., McCarley, J. S., Crowell, J. A., Kaczmarski, H., & Kramer, A. F. (2011). Walking and talking: Dual-Task effects on street crossing behavior in older adults. Psychology and Aging, 26, 260-268.
19. Pashler, H. (1984). Processing stages in overlapping tasks: Evidence for a central bottleneck. Journal of Experimental Psychology: Human Perception and Performance, 10, 358-377.
20. Pashler, H. (1994). Dual-Task interference in simple tasks: Data and theory. Psychological Bulletin, 116, 220-244.
21. Ratcliff, R. (1978). A theory of memory retrieval. Psychological Review, 85, 59-108.
22. Ratcliff, R., Thapar, A., Gomez, P., & McKoon, G. (2004). A diffusion model analysis of the effects of aging in the lexical-decision task. Psychology and Aging, 19, 278-289.
23. Ratcliff, R., Thapar, A., & McKoon, G. (2004). A diffusion model analysis of the effects of aging on recognition memory. Journal of Memory and Language, 50, 408-424.
24. Ratcliff, R., & Tuerlinckx, F. (2002). Estimating parameters of the diffusion model: Approaches to dealing with contaminant reaction times and parameter variability. Psychonomic Bulletin & Review, 9, 438-481.
25. Ratcliff, R., Van Zandt, T., & McKoon, G. (1999). Connectionist and diffusion models of reaction time. Psychological Review, 106, 261-300.
26. Ruthruff, E., Allen, P. A., Lien, M.-C., & Grabbe, J. (2008). Visual word recognition without central attention: Evidence for greater automaticity for greater reading ability. Psychonomic Bulletin and Review, 15, 337-343.
27. Ruthruff, E., Johnston, J. C., & Remington, R. W. (2009). How strategic is the central bottleneck: Can it be overcome by trying harder? Journal of Experimental Psychology: Human Perception and Performance, 35, 1368-1384.
28. Ruthruff, E., Johnston, J. C., & Van Selst, M. (2001). Why practice reduces dualtask interference. Journal of Experimental Psychology: Human Perception and Performance, 27, 3-21.
29. Ruthruff, E., Pashler, H., & Klaassen, A. (2001). Processing bottlenecks in dualtask performance: Structural limitation or voluntary postponement? Psychonomic Bulletin & Review, 8, 73-80.
30. Ruthruff, E., Van Selst, M., Johnston, J. C., & Remington, R. W. (2006). How does practice reduce dual-Task interference: Integration, automatization, or simply stage-shortening? Psychological Research, 70, 125-142.
31. Schmiedek, F., Lovden, M., & Lindenberger, U. (2009). On the relation of mean reaction time and intraindividual reaction time variability. Psychology and Aging, 24, 841-857.
32. Schneider, W., Eschman, A., & Zuccolotto, A. (2002). E-Prime users guide. Pittsburgh: Psychology Software Tools, Inc.
33. Spaniol, J., Madden, D. J., & Voss, A. (2008). A diffusion model analysis of age differences in episodic and semantic long-Term memory retrieval. Journal of Experimental Psychology: Learning, Memory, and Cognition, 32, 101-117.
34. Strobach, T., Liepelt, R., Pashler, H., Frensch, P. A., & Schubert, T. (in press). Effects of extensive dual-Task practice on processing stages in simultaneous choice tasks. Attention, Perception & Psychophysics, 75, 900-920.
35. Telford, C. W. (1931). Refractory phase of voluntary and associative response. Journal of Experimental Psychology, 14, 1-35.
36. Thapar, A., Ratcliff, R., & McKoon, G. (2003). A diffusion model analysis of the effects of aging on letter discrimination. Psychology and Aging, 18, 415-429.
37. Tombu, M., & Jolicoeur, P. (2000, November). Is the PRP effect due to a strategic or structural bottleneck? Paper presented at the 41st annual meeting of the Psychonomic Society, New Orleans, LA.
38. Voss, A., Rothermund, K., & Voss, J. (2004). Interpreting the parameters of the diffusion model: An empirical validation. Memory & Cognition, 32, 1206-1220.
39. Voss, A., & Voss, J. (2007). Fast-dm: A free program for efficient diffusion model analysis. Behavior Research Methods, 39, 767-775.
40. Welford, A. T. (1952). The "psychological refractory period" and the timing of highspeed performance-A review and a theory. British Journal of Psychology, 43, 2-19.