The impact of aging and hearing status on verbal short-term memory.
- Resource Type
- Article
- Authors
- Verhaegen, Clémence; Collette, Fabienne; Majerus, Steve
- Source
- Aging, Neuropsychology & Cognition. Jul2014, Vol. 21 Issue 4, p464-482. 19p.
- Subject
- *PSYCHOLOGICAL aspects of aging
*HEARING
*SHORT-term memory
*YOUNG adult psychology
*COGNITION
*GERIATRIC psychology
- Language
- ISSN
- 1382-5585
The aim of this study is to assess the impact of hearing status on age-related decrease in verbal short-term memory (STM) performance. This was done by administering a battery of verbal STM tasks to elderly and young adult participants matched for hearing thresholds, as well as to young normal-hearing control participants. The matching procedure allowed us to assess the importance of hearing loss as an explanatory factor of age-related STM decline. We observed that elderly participants and hearing-matched young participants showed equal levels of performance in all verbal STM tasks, and performed overall lower than the normal-hearing young control participants. This study provides evidence for recent theoretical accounts considering reduced hearing level as an important explanatory factor of poor auditory-verbal STM performance in older adults. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]