Preserved memory-based orienting of attention with impaired explicit memory in healthy ageing.

It is increasingly recognised that spatial contextual long-term memory (LTM) prepares neural activity for guiding visuo-spatial attention in a proactive manner. In the current study, we investigated whether the decline in explicit memory observed in healthy ageing would compromise this mechanism. We...

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Main Authors: Salvato, G, Patai, E, Nobre, A
Format: Journal article
Language:English
Published: Elsevier 2015
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author Salvato, G
Patai, E
Nobre, A
author_facet Salvato, G
Patai, E
Nobre, A
author_sort Salvato, G
collection OXFORD
description It is increasingly recognised that spatial contextual long-term memory (LTM) prepares neural activity for guiding visuo-spatial attention in a proactive manner. In the current study, we investigated whether the decline in explicit memory observed in healthy ageing would compromise this mechanism. We compared the behavioural performance of younger and older participants on learning new contextual memories, on orienting visual attention based on these learnt contextual associations, and on explicit recall of contextual memories. We found a striking dissociation between older versus younger participants in the relationship between the ability to retrieve contextual memories versus the ability to use these to guide attention to enhance performance on a target-detection task. Older participants showed significant deficits in the explicit retrieval task, but their behavioural benefits from memory-based orienting of attention were equivalent to those in young participants. Furthermore, memory-based orienting correlated significantly with explicit contextual LTM in younger adults but not in older adults. These results suggest that explicit memory deficits in ageing might not compromise initial perception and encoding of events. Importantly, the results also shed light on the mechanisms of memory-guided attention, suggesting that explicit contextual memories are not necessary.
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spelling oxford-uuid:62088b7a-4939-4956-b24f-d70393a6f25b2022-03-26T18:03:46ZPreserved memory-based orienting of attention with impaired explicit memory in healthy ageing.Journal articlehttp://purl.org/coar/resource_type/c_dcae04bcuuid:62088b7a-4939-4956-b24f-d70393a6f25bEnglishSymplectic Elements at OxfordElsevier2015Salvato, GPatai, ENobre, AIt is increasingly recognised that spatial contextual long-term memory (LTM) prepares neural activity for guiding visuo-spatial attention in a proactive manner. In the current study, we investigated whether the decline in explicit memory observed in healthy ageing would compromise this mechanism. We compared the behavioural performance of younger and older participants on learning new contextual memories, on orienting visual attention based on these learnt contextual associations, and on explicit recall of contextual memories. We found a striking dissociation between older versus younger participants in the relationship between the ability to retrieve contextual memories versus the ability to use these to guide attention to enhance performance on a target-detection task. Older participants showed significant deficits in the explicit retrieval task, but their behavioural benefits from memory-based orienting of attention were equivalent to those in young participants. Furthermore, memory-based orienting correlated significantly with explicit contextual LTM in younger adults but not in older adults. These results suggest that explicit memory deficits in ageing might not compromise initial perception and encoding of events. Importantly, the results also shed light on the mechanisms of memory-guided attention, suggesting that explicit contextual memories are not necessary.
spellingShingle Salvato, G
Patai, E
Nobre, A
Preserved memory-based orienting of attention with impaired explicit memory in healthy ageing.
title Preserved memory-based orienting of attention with impaired explicit memory in healthy ageing.
title_full Preserved memory-based orienting of attention with impaired explicit memory in healthy ageing.
title_fullStr Preserved memory-based orienting of attention with impaired explicit memory in healthy ageing.
title_full_unstemmed Preserved memory-based orienting of attention with impaired explicit memory in healthy ageing.
title_short Preserved memory-based orienting of attention with impaired explicit memory in healthy ageing.
title_sort preserved memory based orienting of attention with impaired explicit memory in healthy ageing
work_keys_str_mv AT salvatog preservedmemorybasedorientingofattentionwithimpairedexplicitmemoryinhealthyageing
AT pataie preservedmemorybasedorientingofattentionwithimpairedexplicitmemoryinhealthyageing
AT nobrea preservedmemorybasedorientingofattentionwithimpairedexplicitmemoryinhealthyageing