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Aging-related changes of neural mechanisms underlying visual-spatial working memory
Martina Piefke1, Özgür A Onur, Gereon R Fink
1Cognitive Neurology Section, Institute of Neuroscience and Medicine, Research Centre, Jülich, Germany. martina.piefke@uni-bielefeld.de
Neurobiology of Aging
|December 7, 2010
Summary
Aging reduces prefrontal cortex (PFC) working memory (WM) capacity. Neuroimaging reveals brain reorganizations in older adults, but these compensatory mechanisms do not prevent performance decline in visual-spatial WM tasks.
Area of Science:
- Neuroscience
- Cognitive Aging
- Neuroimaging
Background:
- Prefrontal cortex (PFC) functions, including working memory (WM), decline with age.
- The neurofunctional mechanisms underlying age-related cognitive decline are not fully understood.
- The Hemispheric Asymmetry Reduction in the PFC associated with Aging (HAROLD) model suggests reduced PFC lateralization in older adults.
Purpose of the Study:
- To investigate age-related neurofunctional alterations during visual-spatial WM task performance.
- To examine the impact of task difficulty on brain activity in younger and older adults.
- To test the validity of the HAROLD model in the context of visual-spatial WM.
Main Methods:
- Functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) was used to measure brain activity.
- Participants performed a visual-spatial WM task with varying difficulty levels.
- Brain activation patterns in younger and older adults were compared.
Main Results:
- Older adults showed bilateral dorsolateral PFC activation, while younger adults showed left-lateralized activation, supporting the HAROLD model.
- Functional reorganization was observed in parieto-occipital areas in older adults.
- An age-related reversed hemispheric asymmetry of prefrontal activation occurred with increased WM demands.
- Neither PFC nor parieto-occipital reorganizations improved WM performance in older adults compared to younger adults.
Conclusions:
- Frontal-parietal functional reorganizations in older adults may represent compensatory mechanisms.
- These compensatory mechanisms do not fully offset the age-related decline in visual-spatial WM performance.
- Aging impacts PFC function and leads to altered brain activation patterns during demanding cognitive tasks.
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