title: Implicit spatial contextual learning in healthy aging.
abstract: Three experiments investigated the aging of implicit spatial and spatiotemporal context learning in 2 tasks. In contextual cuing, people learn to use repeated spatial configurations to facilitate search for a target, whereas in higher order serial learning, they learn to use subtle sequence regularities to respond more quickly and accurately to a series of events. Results reveal a dissociation; overall contextual cuing is spared in healthy aging, whereas higher order sequence learning is impaired in the same individuals. This finding suggests that these 2 forms of implicit learning rely on different neural substrates that age differently; the results are also consistent with recent evidence that fronto-striatal circuits are particularly susceptible to decline in health aging.
authors.affiliation: Department of Psychology, The Catholic University of America, Washington, DC, USA. howard@cua.edu
authors.forename: James H
authors.initials: JH
authors.lastname: Howard
authors.forename: Darlene V
authors.initials: DV
authors.lastname: Howard
authors.forename: Nancy A
authors.initials: NA
authors.lastname: Dennis
authors.forename: Helen
authors.initials: H
authors.lastname: Yankovich
authors.forename: Chandan J
authors.initials: CJ
authors.lastname: Vaidya
mesh_terms: D000293:Adolescent; D000328:Adult; D000368:Aged; D000375:Aging / Q000502:physiology*; D000704:Analysis of Variance; D001364:Awareness; D003210:Concept Formation; D003463:Cues; D005260:Female; D006801:Humans; D007406:Interview, Psychological; D008297:Male; D011939:Mental Recall; D010364:Pattern Recognition, Visual / Q000502:physiology*; D011930:Reaction Time / Q000502:physiology; D012691:Serial Learning / Q000502:physiology*; D013028:Space Perception / Q000502:physiology*; D013998:Time Perception