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Updated: Jul 1, 2026
04:30
An Experimental Paradigm for Measuring the Effects of Ageing on Sentence Processing
Published on: October 25, 2019
Understanding How Older Adults Comprehend Simple Comparative Sentences in a Predicate-Final Language
Jimin Park1, Seunghun J Lee2,3, Jee Eun Sung1,4,5
1Department of Communication Disorders, Ewha Womans University, Seoul, South Korea.
Summary
Aging impacts sentence comprehension, with older adults showing slower processing of comparative sentences. Working memory capacity influences how quickly individuals process complex sentence structures.
Area of Science:
- Psycholinguistics
- Cognitive Neuroscience
- Developmental Psychology
Background:
- Sentence comprehension abilities can decline with age.
- Individual differences in cognitive abilities, such as working memory, may influence language processing in older adults.
Purpose of the Study:
- To investigate the effects of aging on the comprehension of simple comparative sentences in a predicate-final language.
- To explore individual variability in sentence comprehension among older adults based on performance levels.
Main Methods:
- A sentence-picture matching task was administered to 221 participants across different age groups (young and old).
- Comparative sentences were manipulated for word order (comparee-first, standard-first).
- Response accuracy and response time (RT) were analyzed, along with working memory (WM) scores for older adults.
Main Results:
- Older adults exhibited slower response times (RT) compared to young adults in processing comparative sentences, particularly in comparee-first constructions.
- A significant interaction between word order and working memory (WM) scores was observed in RT.
- Higher WM scores correlated with faster RT for comparee-first constructions, indicating the role of cognitive resources.
Conclusions:
- Age-related differences in sentence processing are evident even in simple syntactic structures, highlighting sensitivity to cognitive aging.
- The interaction between working memory capacity and syntactic structure underscores the need to integrate cognitive and linguistic factors in models of sentence comprehension across the lifespan.
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