Changes in Memory Capacity across the Lifespan

这项拟议的工作旨在研究记忆处理的实时能力可能因年龄和疾病而发生的变化。一种新的基于反应延迟的处理能力测量将被添加到对检测记忆损害敏感的性能测量中(自由和线索选择性提醒测试)。我们将比较三组健康成年人的加工能力：大学、中年和老年。此外，健康老年人的处理能力将与患有轻度认知障碍的老年人的处理能力进行比较。预计将检测到与年龄和疾病有关的容量变化，展示增加诊断工具的潜力，并对正常与年龄有关的记忆变化的性质提供更多的洞察。使用这一衡量标准需要应用新的统计工具；因此，这项工作将展示这些统计技术的效用和适用性。

The proposed work seeks to examine the possible age- and disease-related changes in the real-time capacity of memory processing. A novel measure of processing capacity, based on response latencies, will be added to a performance measure that has been sensititive in detecting memory impairment (the Free and Cued Selective Reminding Test). Processing capacity will be compared in three groups of healthy adults: college-aged, middle-aged, and elderly. In addition, processing capacity in healthy elderly adults will be compared to processing capacity in elderly adults with mild cognitive impairment. It is expected that age- and disease-related changes in capacity will be detected, demonstrating the potential for augmenting diagnostic tools and providing additional insight into the nature of normal age-related changes in memory. Use of this measure requires application of novel statistical tools; consequently, this work will provide a demonstration of the utility and applicability of these statistical techniques.