Effects of age and divided attention on memory components derived for the category exemplar generation task

Age differences in memory performances on a conceptually driven task, the category exemplar generation (CEG) test, were investigated. Thirty-six younger adults and 36 healthy older adults studied word lists in full and divided attention conditions. Recall was tested with category names. The process-dissociation procedure was used to derive estimates of controlled and automatic memory. Old-old adults (70-84 years) exhibited poorer conscious recollection than both younger (18-24) and young-old adults (59-69). In contrast, no age differences were found in estimates of automatic memory. For the younger and older adults, the divided encoding manipulation reduced both the consciously controlled and automatic estimates of memory. The results suggest that the few prior findings of age deficits in priming on the CEG may have been an artifact of contamination from conscious retrieval processes. They also indicate that the opportunity for greater semantic processing enhances the conceptual priming of both younger and older adults.