title: Stimulus-independent semantic bias misdirects word recognition in older adults.
abstract: Older adults' normally adaptive use of semantic context to aid in word recognition can have a negative consequence of causing misrecognitions, especially when the word actually spoken sounds similar to a word that more closely fits the context. Word-pairs were presented to young and older adults, with the second word of the pair masked by multi-talker babble varying in signal-to-noise ratio. Results confirmed older adults' greater tendency to misidentify words based on their semantic context compared to the young adults, and to do so with a higher level of confidence. This age difference was unaffected by differences in the relative level of acoustic masking.
authors.affiliation: Volen National Center for Complex Systems, Brandeis University, Waltham, Massachusetts 02454-9110, USA rogersc@ent.wustl.edu; wingfiel@brandeis.edu.
authors.forename: Chad S
authors.initials: CS
authors.lastname: Rogers
authors.affiliation: Volen National Center for Complex Systems, Brandeis University, Waltham, Massachusetts 02454-9110, USA rogersc@ent.wustl.edu; wingfiel@brandeis.edu.
authors.forename: Arthur
authors.initials: A
authors.lastname: Wingfield
mesh_terms: D000161:Acoustic Stimulation; D000293:Adolescent; D000368:Aged; D000369:Aged, 80 and over; D000375:Aging / Q000502:physiology*; D006801:Humans; D010470:Perceptual Masking / Q000502:physiology; D021641:Recognition, Psychology / Q000502:physiology*; D012660:Semantics; D013067:Speech Perception / Q000502:physiology; D055815:Young Adult