Rapid speech processing and divided attention: processing rate versus processing resources as an explanation of age effects.
The authors conducted a dual-task study to examine age differences in speech processing under varying loads. Younger and older adults listened to and immediately recalled spoken passages presented at various speech rates (140-280 words per min). This task was performed alone as well as in a divided-attention condition in which subjects concurrently performed a picture recognition task. Consistent with the slowing hypothesis, older adults' immediate memory performance was differentially depressed when speech rates were very fast. The Age x Speech Rate interaction, however, was not exacerbated in the divided-attention condition. This suggests that aging may reduce the rate at which the processing operations underlying memory for speech are completed, but this is conceptually distinct from an age-related reduction in attentional capacity.
Tun
P A
PA
Department of Psychology, Brandeis University, Waltham, Massachusetts 02254-9110.
Wingfield
A
A
Stine
E A
EA
Mecsas
C
C
D000293:Adolescent; D000328:Adult; D000368:Aged; D000375:Aging / Q000523:psychology*; D001288:Attention; D005260:Female; D006801:Humans; D008297:Male; D011939:Mental Recall; D008875:Middle Aged; D010364:Pattern Recognition, Visual; D011597:Psychomotor Performance; D011930:Reaction Time; D013067:Speech Perception