title: Aging, memory load, and resource allocation during reading.
abstract: To test the notion that aging brings an inability to self-initiate processing, the authors investigated the effects of memory load on online sentence understanding. Younger and older adults read a series of short passages with or without a simultaneous updating task, which would be expected to deplete resources by consuming memory capacity. Regression analyses of word-by-word reading times onto text variables within each condition were used to decompose reading times into resources allocated to the array of word-level and textbase-level processes needed for comprehension. Among neither the young nor the old were word-level processes disrupted by a simultaneous memory load. However, older readers showed relatively greater levels of resource allocation to conceptual integration than the younger adults when under load, regardless of working-memory span or task priority. These results suggest that the ability to self-initiate the allocation of processing resources during reading is preserved among older readers.
authors.affiliation: Department of Psychology, University of New Hampshire, USA.
authors.forename: Andrew P
authors.initials: AP
authors.lastname: Smiler
authors.forename: Danielle D
authors.initials: DD
authors.lastname: Gagne
authors.forename: Elizabeth A L
authors.initials: EA
authors.lastname: Stine-Morrow
mesh_terms: D000293:Adolescent; D000328:Adult; D000368:Aged; D000369:Aged, 80 and over; D000375:Aging / Q000502:physiology*; D003657:Decision Making; D005260:Female; D006801:Humans; D008297:Male; D008568:Memory; D008875:Middle Aged; D011897:Random Allocation; D011932:Reading; D013997:Time Factors