MODELING THE EFFECTS OF AGING ON REACTION TIME

描述（改编自研究者摘要）：研究者建议 从反应时间域的理论建模， 老化域和反应时间。随机游走和扩散模型能够 拟合一系列超过平均反应时间的实验数据， 这些模型正在为会计制定新的标准， 反应时间现象提出了五条实验路线，每条要求 关于简单认知和知觉刺激的二选一决策。各种 实验对认知过程有不同的限制：前两个 要求受试者学习刺激-反应映射;后两个限制 通过限制编码时间和刺激可辨别性来进行感知过程; 第三个需要记忆。对于所有五项任务， 标准反应时间任务，速度与准确性指令， 限制受试者必须作出回应的时间的截止日期。模型将适合于 每个任务的所有数据，包括正确和错误的反应时间 反应，反应准确性，反应时与准确性的关系， 以及反应时间分布的形状。模型参数 将被用来解释衰老缺陷。例如， 扩散模型允许进入决策的信息的质量 过程与过程的其他组分分离。的 研究人员预计，这种理论方法将提供更多的 比布林利图分析，目前处理的完整图片 年龄对反应时间影响的主要解释。

DESCRIPTION (adapted from investigator's abstract): The investigator proposes to bring theoretical modeling from the reaction time domain to bear on the domain of aging and reaction time. Random walk and diffusion models are able to fit a range of experimental data beyond mean reaction time, and there appears to be a consensus that these models are setting new standards in accounting for reaction time phenomena. Five lines of experiments are proposed, each requiring two-choice decisions about simple cognitive and perceptual stimuli. Each kind of experiment places different limits on cognitive processes: the first two require subjects to learn stimulus-to-response mappings; the second two limit perceptual processes by limiting encoding time and stimulus discriminability; and the third requires memory. For all five tasks, performance will be examined with standard reaction time tasks, speed versus accuracy instructions, and deadlines that limit the time subjects have to respond. Models will be fit to all of the data from each task, including reaction times for correct and error responses, response accuracy, the relations among reaction time and accuracy, and the shapes of the reaction time distributions. Parameters of the models will be used to interpret aging deficits. For example, the parameters of the diffusion model allow the quality of the information entering decision processes to be separated from other components of the processes. The investigators anticipate that this theoretical approach will provide a more complete picture of processing than the Brinley plot analyses that currently dominate explanations of aging effects on reaction time.