Age-related slowing of control processes: evidence from a response coordination task

Normal aging is associated with slowing of performance mostly due to a slowed functioning of central response-related processes. In this paper we set out to discover whether slowing occurs also when the process controlling the coordination of responses is engaged by the task. To this end, we compared the mean-reaction time performance of two groups of subjects (young vs. elderly) in single- and dual-task experimental paradigm. The response coordination process is required only by the dual-task paradigm. The results indicate that, in the dual-task situation, the elderly are markedly slower than young subjects. The eventual relevance of information-processing speed in determining the cognitive performance of the elderly is considered in the discussion of the results.