A Model-Based Approach to Understanding Memory Impairments in Normal Aging

描述（由申请人提供）：正常衰老的最具破坏性的影响之一是越来越难以回忆最近的事件，特别是当这些事件受到在不同背景下学习的相关记忆的干扰时。虽然形成和回忆情景记忆的困难是衰老过程的一个标志，但其背后的机制在很大程度上仍然未知。我们采用计算建模的方法来帮助阐明这些机制在三个主要的实验室记忆任务和更自然的“真实的世界”的任务。该应用程序的关键创新是在其建议，以适应高分辨率的个体受试者的数据在多个实验中获得，并检查年龄差异的最佳拟合参数的分布，这将使我们能够检测亚组的老年人，显示不同的配置文件的损害。由于高性能计算技术的进步，在足够高分辨率的数据下，这种研究衰老的新方法已经变得可行。年龄影响的记忆系统的计算建模不仅可以更好地了解老化的记忆，而且还提供了一个理论基础，在此基础上建立潜在的计划，为老年人患有与年龄相关的记忆障碍的记忆补救。

DESCRIPTION (provided by applicant): One of the most damaging effects of normal aging is an increasing difficulty in recalling recent events especially when those events are subject to interference from related memories learned in different contexts. Although this difficulty in forming and recalling episodic memories is a hallmark of the aging process, the mechanisms that underlie it remain largely unknown. We adopt a computational modeling approach to help elucidate these mechanisms in three major laboratory memory tasks and in more naturalistic "real world" tasks. The key innovation of this application is in its proposal to fit high-resolutio individual subject data obtained in multisession experiments and to examine age-differences in terms of the distributions of best fitting parameters, which will allow us to detect subgroups of older adults that show different profiles of impairment. Given data of sufficiently high resolution this novel approach to aging research has become feasible thanks to advances in high-performance computing. Computational modeling of age-affected memory systems could lead not only to a better understanding of aging memory, but also provide a theoretical basis on which to build potential schemes for memory remediation among older adults suffering age-related memory impairment.