title: Visual rightward spatial bias varies as a function of age.
abstract: Age-related changes in visual spatial biases in children, young adults, and older adults were studied with unilateral and bilateral stimulus conditions in fast-paced linguistic and non-linguistic attention tasks. Only rightward spatial biases were observed. The incidence of the biases changed as a function of age: in childhood and in old age the rightward spatial biases were more common than in young adulthood. The present rightward spatial biases were similar to those observed in the corresponding auditory spatial linguistic and non-linguistic attention tests (Takio, Koivisto, Laukka, & Hämäläinen, 2011) and in the dichotic listening forced-attention task (Takio et al., 2009). We suggest that the multimodal rightward spatial bias observed under intensive attentional load is related to a right hemispace preference and modulated by age-dependent changes in executive functions.
authors.affiliation: Department of Psychology, University of Turku, Turku, Finland. fiia.takio@utu.fi
authors.forename: Fiia
authors.initials: F
authors.lastname: Takio
authors.forename: Mika
authors.initials: M
authors.lastname: Koivisto
authors.forename: Tuulikki
authors.initials: T
authors.lastname: Tuominen
authors.forename: Seppo J
authors.initials: SJ
authors.lastname: Laukka
authors.forename: Heikki
authors.initials: H
authors.lastname: Hämäläinen
mesh_terms: D000328:Adult; D000368:Aged; D000375:Aging / Q000502:physiology*; D000704:Analysis of Variance; D001288:Attention / Q000502:physiology*; D002648:Child; D002675:Child, Preschool; D004192:Discrimination, Psychological / Q000502:physiology; D005403:Fixation, Ocular / Q000502:physiology; D006801:Humans; D008875:Middle Aged; D010364:Pattern Recognition, Visual / Q000502:physiology*; D010775:Photic Stimulation; D011930:Reaction Time / Q000502:physiology; D013028:Space Perception / Q000502:physiology*; D014794:Visual Fields / Q000502:physiology*; D014796:Visual Perception / Q000502:physiology