INDIVIDUAL DIFFERENCES IN BASIC NORMAL INFORMATION PROCESSES

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The research being conducted in this area by the LSES is directed at examining in normals, basic cognitive issues arising from our comparisons of the cognitive functioning of schizophrenic and normal individuals. Central to this research is the investigation of basic aspects of selective attention- how organisms selectively respond to a target stimulus when other stimuli in the environment evoke competing responses. One series of experiments whose analyses we completed and whose results were accepted for publication this year investigated selective attention through the use of the Stroop task. Using randomized stimulus onset asynchronies (SOA) we demonstrated, as distinct from earlier findings using blocked SOAs, singular and different peaks in interference and facilitation. Other experiments in this project that focus on selective attention investigate "negative priming". In keeping with the LSES interest in normal aging these experiments testing a major hypothesis regarding the nature of cognitive aging according to which older adults demonstrate deficits in inhibitory processing. Such deficits should in theory lead to decreases in negative priming.