EFFECTS OF AGING ON MEMORY FOR SOURCE OF INFORMATION

与年轻人相比，老年人不仅难以记住内容，而且特别是在记住来源方面存在问题（例如，说话者、时间或空间上下文、模态）。随着人口老龄化，这种自传体或“情节”记忆的丧失将影响越来越多的人。能够记住信息而不是信息来源的潜在实际后果是广泛的--从记得把药喷到哪里而不是哪里的挫折感，到在目击者的情况下可能更容易受到错误记忆的影响，或者发展出妄想。拟议的研究集中在检索和评价阶段的情景记忆（源监测）。这些过程在自发或反思活动的程度上各不相同。启发式过程相对简单，涉及基于现成信息的简单匹配。系统化的过程更复杂（受控），涉及自我启动的检索和简单过程的迭代。现有证据表明，随着任务的反思需求变得越来越大，老年人更有可能表现出缺陷。此外，来自脑损伤人群和神经影像学研究的证据表明，前额叶皮层（PFC）对情景记忆很重要。基于一个新的分析的文献和我们的初步研究结果，我们假设，在右PFC的区域subserve相对启发式的过程和左PFC或双边合作之间的权利和左PFC subserve更系统的过程。我们还提出，与年龄相关的源监测下降的生理基础主要是由于招募左PFC的过程功能障碍，或右PFC和左PFC的相互作用。目击者记忆、说话人识别）任务，用于评估多维记忆的监控，以及更简单的任务，用于隔离源监控的各种组成过程。主观评级的质量的记忆相结合，更客观的行为措施的来源记忆，以评估充分的离散和连续的定量模型的来源监测。一个认知/行为的方法相结合的功能磁共振成像技术，调查潜在的年龄相关的差异，和神经基础，源归因过程的子组件，包括减少使用多个决策维度的能力，更大的困难之间切换的尺寸，并难以保持适当的标准上的一个或多个尺寸。

Compared to younger adults, older adults not only have difficulty remembering the content but, especially, they have problems in remembering the source (e.g., speaker, temporal or spatial context, modality) of information. Such a loss of autobiographical or "episodic" memory will affect an increasing number of people as the population ages. The potential practical consequences of being able to remember information, but not its source, are far-ranging-from the frustration of remembering puffing medicine away for safekeeping but not where, to potential increased vulnerability to false memories in eyewitness situations or to the development of delusions. The proposed research focuses on the retrieval and evaluation phase of episodic remembering (source monitoring). These processes vary in degree of self-initiated or reflective activity. Heuristic processes are relatively simple, involving easy matches based on readily available information. Systematic processes are more complex (controlled), involving self-initiated retrieval and iterations of simpler processes. Available evidence suggests that as the reflective demands of tasks become greater, older adults are more likely to show deficits. Furthermore, evidence from brain damaged populations and from neuroimaging studies, suggests that prefrontal cortex (PFC) is important for episodic remembering. Based on a new analysis of the literature and our preliminary findings, we hypothesize that regions in right PFC subserve relatively heuristic processes and that left PFC or bilateral cooperation between right and left PFC subserve more systematic processes. We also propose that the physiological basis for age- related declines in source monitoring is largely due to dysfunction of processes that recruit left PFC, or the interaction of right and left PFC. We use naturalistic (e.g., eyewitness memory, speaker identification) tasks for assessing the monitoring of multidimensional memories and simpler tasks to isolate various component processes of source monitoring. Subjective ratings of qualities of memories are combined with more objective behavioral measures of source memory to assess the adequacy of discrete and continuous quantitative models of source monitoring. A cognitive/behavioral approach is combined with fMRI imaging techniques to investigate potential age-related differences in, and the neural basis of, subcomponents of source attribution processes, including reduced ability to use multiple decision dimensions, greater difficulty switching between dimensions, and difficulty maintaining appropriate criteria on one or more dimensions.