Aging and longitudinal change in perceptual-motor skill acquisition in healthy adults.
Knowledge about aging of perceptual-motor skills is based almost exclusively on cross-sectional studies. We examined age-related changes in the retention of mirror-tracing skills in healthy adults who practiced for 3 separate days at baseline and retrained 5 years later at follow-up. Overall, the speed and accuracy of an acquired skill were partially retained after a 5-year interim, although the same asymptote was reached. Analyses with individual learning curves indicated that the effects of age on mirror-tracing speed were greater at longitudinal follow-up than at baseline, with older adults requiring more training to reach asymptote. Thus, although the long-term retention of acquired skills declines with age, older adults still retain the ability to learn the skill. Moreover, those who maintained a processing speed comparable with that of the younger participants evidenced no age-related performance decrements on the mirror-drawing task.
Institute of Gerontology, Wayne State University, 226 Knapp Building, 87 E. Ferry St., Detroit MI 48202, USA.
Karen M
KM
Rodrigue
Kristen M
KM
Kennedy
Naftali
N
Raz
D000328:Adult; D000367:Age Factors; D000368:Aged; D000375:Aging / Q000523:psychology*; D005260:Female; D005500:Follow-Up Studies; D006304:Health Status; D006801:Humans; D007858:Learning; D008297:Male; D008875:Middle Aged; D009048:Motor Skills; D010468:Perceptual Disorders / Q000453:epidemiology*; D011596:Psychomotor Disorders / Q000453:epidemiology*; D011930:Reaction Time; D012153:Retention, Psychology; D012737:Sex Factors; D013997:Time Factors