Dissociation between performance on abstract tests of executive function and problem solving in real-life-type situations in normal aging
Dissociation between performance on abstract tests of executive function and problem solving in real-life-type situations in normal aging
复制标题
正常衰老过程中执行功能抽象测试的表现与现实生活中的问题解决能力之间的脱节
作者：
S. Crawford;S. Channon
这项研究考察了正常衰老对现实生活中解决问题能力的影响，使用了之前发现的对涉及额叶的病变敏感的问题。抽象神经心理测试评估的执行能力随着正常年龄的增长而下降。衰老对依赖于日常知识和经验的任务的影响还不太清楚。在本研究中，研究人员比较了健康老年人和年轻人解决现实生活中各种日常人际关系问题的能力。研究人员还对他们的表现进行了一系列标准化的神经心理学测试，其中包括执行能力。老年人在解决日常问题的大多数方面与年轻人相似，尽管老年人在产生潜在问题解决方案方面似乎使用了与年轻人不同的策略。在执行测试中，两组人都表现正常。基于原始分数而不是年龄调整分数的比较显示，年轻的一组在执行测试中表现更好，但在解决问题的任务中表现不佳。讨论了当前任务中知识和经验对解决问题的可能贡献。老年人更丰富的生活经验可能是维持解决问题能力的最大贡献因素。
This study examined the effects of normal aging on real-life-type problem-solving performance, using problems that had previously been found to be sensitive to lesions involving the frontal lobes. Executive skills assessed on abstract neuropsychological tests tend to decrease with normal aging. The effects of aging on tasks reliant on everyday knowledge and experience are less well understood. In the present study, groups of healthy older and younger people were compared on ability to solve real-life-type problems covering a range of everyday interpersonal situations. Performance was also examined on a range of standardized neuropsychological tests involving executive skills. Older people were similar to younger people in most aspects of everyday problem-solving performance, although the older group appeared to use a different strategy to the younger group in generating potential problem solutions. Both groups performed normally for their age on the executive tests. Comparisons based on raw scores rather than age-adjusted scores showed the younger group to perform better on the executive tests, but not on the problem-solving task. The possible contribution of knowledge and experience to problem solving on the current task is discussed. The greater life experience of the older group is likely to be the biggest contributory factor in maintaining problem-solving performance.