Stereotype threat in older adults

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DESCRIPTION (provided by applicant): Almost everyone has at least one social identity that is associated with a negative stereotype. For some people it is their age, for others it is their race, weight, religion, socioeconomic status or political affiliation. Problematically, according t stereotype threat theory, when people encounter these negative stereotypes they often underperform compared to their potential, and in doing so inadvertently confirm the stereotype. For example, older adults are stereotyped as having poor memory abilities. When this stereotype becomes salient to older adults their memory performance tends to decrease. This has serious clinical implications. In one study, stereotype threat increased the proportion of older adults scoring below the clinical cut-off for dementia from 14 to 70%. Given that 20% of Americans will be over the age of 65 by 2030, and that annual dementia screenings are now covered by Medicare, it is important to understand why stereotype threat impairs older adults' performance and how stereotype-threat-related performance deficits can be ameliorated. In Aim 1, we test the role of regulatory focus in contributing to older adults' stereotype threat effects. Regulatory focus theory leads to the counterintuitive hypothesis that although stereotype threat impairs performance when the task emphasizes gains, it should improve performance when the task emphasizes losses. Our preliminary data supports this; stereotype threat impaired older adults' memory when remembering led to gains, but improved memory when forgetting led to losses. In this application we test the generalizability of these results by examining how stereotype threat affects older adults' performance in other cognitive (e.g., verbal fluency, visuospatial skills, decision quality) and non-cognitive (i.e., screened vision and hearing) domains. Many of these domains have not previously been examined. If our regulatory focus predictions are consistently supported, it would suggest that emphasizing the importance of avoiding errors during assessments could be a simple, no-cost clinical intervention to eliminate stereotype threat effects. In Aim 2, we examine the contribution of physiological arousal to older adults' stereotype threat effects. Recently we proposed an arousal-biased competition (ABC) theory. According to our ABC theory, arousal increases the processing of high priority stimuli and decreases processing of low priority stimuli. Preliminary studies support this hypothesis. Of relevance to this application, based upon the regulatory focus theory we predict that under stereotype threat loss-related information is high priority and gain-related information is low priority. Thus, according to ABC theory, arousal should enhance the regulatory focus effects predicted above. Finally, Aim 3 is to examine the functional implications of stereotype threat for older adults. Thus, the domains in which we test our Aim 1 and 2 hypotheses each have relevance for older adults' health, practical, and financial well-being. We also test the hypothesi that genetic testing for Alzheimer's disease carries the risk of inducing stereotype threat and reducing memory performance in asymptomatic, healthy older adults.