The effect of age, visual short-term memory, and performance on a familiar task: a Turkish sample

Young (M = 25 years) and older (M = 61 years) backgammon players with equal experience reconstructed photographs of structured game positions shown for either 2 or 5 s. Reconstruction occurred either immediately or following a 15-s interpolated delay, during which a second photograph was shown. Reconstruction was completed on a backgammon board with all game pieces available. Recall was more accurate for younger players with a 2-s viewing time, but the age difference disappeared when viewing time was increased to 5 s. Interpolated processing decreased accuracy equally for both age groups. Results were interpreted to mean that although older adults took longer to encode information on this task, memory consolidation for both age groups was equally efficient.