The effects of age and environmental familiarity on adults' spatial problem-solving performance: evidence of a hometown advantage.
A coordination of perspectives problem was presented to young, middle-aged, and elderly adults in two spatial settings. In a novel spatial array, elderly adults were less accurate than the other groups under both perspective-taking and mental rotation instructions, and mental rotation was more difficult than perspective-taking for the elderly adults. In contrast, there were no differences between age groups or between perspective-taking and mental rotation when the problem was presented using locations in the subjects' hometown. An explanation based on working memory demands was suggested for these results.
Kirasic
K C
KC
Department of Psychology, University of South Carolina, Columbia 29208.
D000328:Adult; D000368:Aged; D000375:Aging / Q000523:psychology*; D004777:Environment; D005260:Female; D006801:Humans; D008297:Male; D008875:Middle Aged; D011340:Problem Solving; D012399:Rotation; D013037:Spatial Behavior