title: Cultural variation in verbal versus spatial neuropsychological function across the life span.
abstract: Established culture-invariant measures are needed for cross-cultural assessment of verbal and visuospatial speed of processing and working memory across the life span. In this study, 32 younger and 32 older adults from China and from the United States were administered numerically based and spatially based measures of speed of processing and working memory. Chinese superiority on the numerically based tasks was found for younger adults. Age and increasing task demands diminished this cultural effect, as predicted by the framework proposed by D. C. Park, R. Nisbett, and T. Hedden (1999). However, the visuospatial measures of both working memory and speed of processing did not differ cross-culturally for either age group. The authors concluded that these visuospatial measures provide culture-invariant estimates of cognitive processes in East Asian and Western cultures, but that numerically based tasks show evidence of cultural and linguistic biases in performance levels.
authors.affiliation: Department of Psychology, University of Michigan, Ann Arbor 48109, USA. hedden@umich.edu
authors.forename: Trey
authors.initials: T
authors.lastname: Hedden
authors.forename: Denise C
authors.initials: DC
authors.lastname: Park
authors.forename: Richard
authors.initials: R
authors.lastname: Nisbett
authors.forename: Li-Jun
authors.initials: LJ
authors.lastname: Ji
authors.forename: Qicheng
authors.initials: Q
authors.lastname: Jing
authors.forename: Shulan
authors.initials: S
authors.lastname: Jiao
mesh_terms: D000328:Adult; D002681:China; D003431:Cross-Cultural Comparison; D003469:Culture; D005260:Female; D006801:Humans; D008037:Linguistics; D008297:Male; D008568:Memory / Q000502:physiology; D008875:Middle Aged; D013028:Space Perception; D011795:Surveys and Questionnaires; D013997:Time Factors; D014481:United States; D014825:Vocabulary