title: Socio-cognitive profiles for visual learning in young and older adults.
abstract: It is common wisdom that practice makes perfect; but why do some adults learn better than others? Here, we investigate individuals' cognitive and social profiles to test which variables account for variability in learning ability across the lifespan. In particular, we focused on visual learning using tasks that test the ability to inhibit distractors and select task-relevant features. We tested the ability of young and older adults to improve through training in the discrimination of visual global forms embedded in a cluttered background. Further, we used a battery of cognitive tasks and psycho-social measures to examine which of these variables predict training-induced improvement in perceptual tasks and may account for individual variability in learning ability. Using partial least squares regression modeling, we show that visual learning is influenced by cognitive (i.e., cognitive inhibition, attention) and social (strategic and deep learning) factors rather than an individual's age alone. Further, our results show that independent of age, strong learners rely on cognitive factors such as attention, while weaker learners use more general cognitive strategies. Our findings suggest an important role for higher-cognitive circuits involving executive functions that contribute to our ability to improve in perceptual tasks after training across the lifespan.
authors.affiliation: School of Psychology, University of Birmingham Birmingham, UK.
authors.forename: Julie
authors.initials: J
authors.lastname: Christian
authors.affiliation: School of Psychology, University of Birmingham Birmingham, UK.
authors.forename: Aimee
authors.initials: A
authors.lastname: Goldstone
authors.affiliation: Key Laboratory of Brain Functional Genomics, Ministry of Education, Shanghai Key Laboratory of Brain Functional Genomics, East China Normal University Shanghai, China.
authors.forename: Shu-Guang
authors.initials: SG
authors.lastname: Kuai
authors.affiliation: Department of Decision and Information Sciences, Bauer College of Business, University of Houston Houston, TX, USA.
authors.forename: Wynne
authors.initials: W
authors.lastname: Chin
authors.affiliation: Department of Psychology, University of Kent Canterbury, UK.
authors.forename: Dominic
authors.initials: D
authors.lastname: Abrams
authors.affiliation: Department of Psychology, University of Cambridge Cambridge, UK.
authors.forename: Zoe
authors.initials: Z
authors.lastname: Kourtzi
keywords: cognitive abilities; individual differences; perceptual learning; psychophysics; social profiles; visual perception