title: Does the greater involvement of executive control in memory with age act as a compensatory mechanism?
abstract: Recent behavioural and imaging data have shown that memory functioning seems to rely more on executive functions and on the prefrontal cortex (PFC) in older than in young adults. Using a behavioural approach, our objective was to confirm the hypothesis that young and older adults present different patterns of correlation between episodic memory performance and executive functioning. We report three studies comparing the correlations of young and older adults in a broad range of episodic memory and executive function tasks. The results indicated that memory and executive performance were consistently and significantly correlated in older but not in younger adults. Regression analyses confirmed that age-related differences in episodic memory performance could be explained by individual differences in executive functioning. The results are consistent with the view that memory functioning in aging is accompanied by a shift from automatic to controlled forms of processing. They also generalise the executive hypothesis of episodic memory aging and are in line with the idea that executive functions act as a compensatory mechanism against age-related memory decline.
authors.affiliation: University François Rabelais of Tours, UMR CNRS 7295 CeRCA Research Center on Cognition and Learning.
authors.forename: Badiâa
authors.initials: B
authors.lastname: Bouazzaoui
authors.affiliation: University François Rabelais of Tours, UMR CNRS 7295 CeRCA Research Center on Cognition and Learning.
authors.forename: Lucie
authors.initials: L
authors.lastname: Angel
authors.affiliation: University François Rabelais of Tours, UMR CNRS 7295 CeRCA Research Center on Cognition and Learning.
authors.forename: Séverine
authors.initials: S
authors.lastname: Fay
authors.affiliation: University François Rabelais of Tours, UMR CNRS 7295 CeRCA Research Center on Cognition and Learning.
authors.forename: Laurence
authors.initials: L
authors.lastname: Taconnat
authors.affiliation: University François Rabelais of Tours, UMR CNRS 7295 CeRCA Research Center on Cognition and Learning.
authors.forename: Froger
authors.initials: F
authors.lastname: Charlotte
authors.affiliation: University François Rabelais of Tours, UMR CNRS 7295 CeRCA Research Center on Cognition and Learning.
authors.forename: Michel
authors.initials: M
authors.lastname: Isingrini
mesh_terms: D000328:Adult; D000368:Aged; D000369:Aged, 80 and over; D000375:Aging / Q000502:physiology*; D002755:Choice Behavior; D056344:Executive Function / Q000502:physiology*; D005260:Female; D006801:Humans; D007206:Individuality; D008297:Male; D061212:Memory, Episodic; D011939:Mental Recall / Q000502:physiology*; D008875:Middle Aged; D009483:Neuropsychological Tests; D011237:Predictive Value of Tests; D013223:Statistics as Topic; D055815:Young Adult