Outsourcing cognitive control to the environment: adult age differences in the use of task cues.
When an initial phase of cued task switching is followed by a phase of single-task trials, older adults show difficulties changing to the more efficient single-task mode of processing (Mayr & Liebscher, 2001). In Experiment 1, we show that these costs follow older adults' continued tendency to inspect task cues even though these provide no new information. In Experiment 2, we included a condition in which task cues were eliminated from the display after the task-switching phase. In this condition, older adults behaved the same as younger adults, suggesting that the presence of the task cue is critical for observing age differences while switching from a "high-control" to a "low-control" mode of processing. We discuss our results in terms of a life-span shift with regard to the reliance on internal versus external sources of information under conditions of high-control demands.
Spieler
Daniel H
DH
School of Psychology, Georgia Institute of Technology, Atlanta 30332-0170, USA. spieler@gatech.edu
Mayr
Ulrich
U
LaGrone
Susan
S
D000328:Adult; D000368:Aged; D000375:Aging / Q000523:psychology*; D001288:Attention; D003118:Color Perception; D003463:Cues; D005260:Female; D005403:Fixation, Ocular; D006801:Humans; D007389:Internal-External Control; D008297:Male; D008875:Middle Aged; D009949:Orientation; D010364:Pattern Recognition, Visual; D011340:Problem Solving; D011930:Reaction Time; D012438:Saccades; D012931:Social Environment