title: Age and iconic read-out.
abstract: Letter recognition was investigated in 16 young adults (mean age = 21) and in 16 older men (mean age =64) by exposing seven-letter strings for brief periods followed by a mask. Young adults were able to identify three letters at a rate of 27 msec per letter, a value which is typical of other reports. Any additional letters were identified at a much slower rate. In contrast, older adults were able to identify only two letters, at a rate of 35 msec per letter. Older men thus showed a decline in both the amount of and rate at which information was encoded from the icon within a fixation period. These findings have implications for experiments involving visual arrays.
mesh_terms: D000293:Adolescent; D000328:Adult; D000368:Aged; D000375:Aging; D005556:Form Perception; D006801:Humans; D008297:Male; D008568:Memory; D011939:Mental Recall; D008875:Middle Aged; D010364:Pattern Recognition, Visual; D010470:Perceptual Masking; D011930:Reaction Time; D013028:Space Perception; D014794:Visual Fields