Cognitive control mediates age-related changes in flexible anticipatory processing during listening comprehension

Area of Science:

• Cognitive Neuroscience
• Psycholinguistics
• Aging Research

Background:

• Effective listening requires integrating local linguistic input with global contextual cues.
• Predictive processing, or anticipating upcoming words, aids local sentence comprehension.
• Young adults adapt predictions based on global cues like speaker reliability, but this is unknown for older adults.

Purpose of the Study:

• Investigate if older adults flexibly adapt predictive listening based on global speaker reliability.
• Determine if mechanisms for local prediction differ from global context adaptation.
• Examine how typical aging affects these predictive processing mechanisms.

Main Methods:

• Presented sentences from reliable (80% predictable) and unreliable (20% predictable) speakers to young and older adults.
• Measured neural responses, specifically the N400 event-related potential, to assess predictability effects.
• Assessed cognitive control using Stroop interference tasks.

Main Results:

• Young adults showed N400 modulation by speaker reliability, indicating adapted predictions.
• Older adults, on average, did not exhibit this global modulation of local processing.
• Cognitive control mediated age-related differences, with higher control linked to better adaptation to speaker reliability.

Conclusions:

• Cognitive control is crucial for regulating top-down predictions based on global context, aiding both age groups.
• Sensitivity to global speaker cues, but not local predictability, was linked to cognitive control.
• Suggests separable neural mechanisms support local predictive processing and adaptation to global contextual information in aging.