Chapter TwentyFour

1
Chapter Twenty-Four

• Late Adulthood
• Cognitive Development

PowerPoints prepared by Cathie Robertson,
Grossmont College Revised by Jenni Fauchier,
Metropolitan Community College
2
Changes in Information Processing

• Schaies study found decline in all 5 primary
  mental abilities
• verbal meaning
• spatial orientation
• inductive reasoning
• number ability
• word fluency

3
Input Sensing and Perceiving

• With age it takes longer for information to
  register in sensory registerholds incoming
  sensory information for a split second after it
  is received
• small reductions in sensitivity and power
• sensory receptors (eyes, ears, etc.) now less
  acute
• deficits can be compensated for if person is
  aware of reduction

4
Input Sensing and Perceiving, cont.

• However, for information to reach perception,
  must cross sensory threshold
• senses must pick up relevant sensations
• this is where significant decline occurs
• problem becomes serious because it is insidious
• person is unaware of things not seen or heard
• after time may miss substantial amount of
  information

5
Working Memory

• Working, or Short-Term Memory
• processing component through which current,
  conscious mental activity occurs
• Two Interrelated Functions
• serves as temporary information storage
• processes information held in mind

6
Working Memory, cont.

• Older adults smaller working memory capacity
  than younger adults
• multitasking especially difficult focusing helps
  to compensate
• Explanations for Decline
• inability to screen out distractions and inhibit
  irrelevant thoughts
• decline in total mental energy

7
Long-Term Memory

• Knowledge Base
• long-term storehouse of information and memories
• evidence suggests memory for vocabulary remains
  unimpaired and can increase with age
• areas of expertise relatively unimpaired
• Source amnesiaforgetting who or what was source
  of fact, idea, or conversation
• increasingly common in late adulthood

8
Control Processes

• Part of the information-processing system that
  regulates analysis and flow of information
• e.g., selective attention, retrieval strategies,
  storage mechanisms, logical analysis
• Older adults unable to gather and consider all
  data relevant to logical analysis and decision
  making
• rather, they rely on prior knowledge,
  rule-of-thumb, general principles

9
Control Processes, cont.

• Use of retrieval strategies also declines with
  age
• possible to learn better retrieval strategies,
  but does not overcome age-related problems in
  memory and control

10
Explicit and Implicit Memory

• Explicit memoryinvolves facts, definitions,
  data, concepts, etc.
• learned consciously through deliberate repetition
  and review
• because of rehearsal, usually easily retrieved
• Implicit memoryinformation that is an
  unconscious or automatic memory such as habits,
  emotional responses, routines
• contents not deliberately memorized

11
Resistance

• Rather than direct result of aging, decline may
  be result of
• refusal to guess
• deliberate choice
• resistance to change
• reluctance to use memory aids

12
Reasons for Age-Related Changes

• Causes of declines in cognitive functioning
• primary aging
• secondary aging
• ageism
• either reflected in self-perception
• or embedded in way scientists measure cognition

13
Primary Aging

• Brain Slowdown
• reduced production of neurotransmitters that
  allow nerve impulses to jump across synapse from
  one neuron to another
• decrease in total volume of neural fluid
• decrease in speed of cerebral blood flow
• slower pace of activation of various parts of
  cortex
• Slowdown may affect learning new material, but
  the types of thinking not involving speed are
  less affected

14
Compensation

• Strategies of Older Adults
• employ memory tricks
• use written reminders
• allow for more time to solve problems
• repeat confusing instructions
• Older adults slower but not less accurate than
  younger adults

15
Terminal Decline

• Overall slowdown of cognitive abilities in days
  or months before death
• marked loss of intellectual power
• results not from agerather from being close to
  death
• Change in cognitive ability and increased
  depression often precede visible worsening of
  health

16
Secondary Aging

• Several diseases impair cognition among aging
• dementia, hypertension, diabetes,
  arteriosclerosis, and diseases affecting lungs
• Lifestyle habits contribute to these diseases
• poor eating, smoking, lack of exercise

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Secondary Aging, cont.

• Brain deterioration due to poor lifestyle habits
  can be halted by
• improved nutrition and exercise
• various drugs, e.g., long-term use of
  anti-inflammatory steroids
• aspirin and ibuprofen

18
Attitudes of the Elderly

• Influence of Expectations and Stereotyping
• people aged 5070 overestimate their early
  adulthood memory skills, which can lead to loss
  of confidence that impairs present memory
• confidence in memory skills also eroded when
  others interpret hesitancy as sign of impaired
  memory

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Ageism in Research

• Laboratory research may favor younger adults,
  rather than older because
• older adults at intellectual best early in day at
  home
• Experiments on memory biased toward people used
  to being tested
• in school setting, young adults regularly
  memorize information not immediately relevant to
  daily life
• older adults unpracticed at, and may be
  suspicious of, exams

20
Beyond Ageism

• Laboratory research on memory
• uniformly reports some memory loss in late
  adulthood
• but few older adults consider memory loss
  significant handicap
• Compensate by using reminders
• the more realistic the circumstances, the better
  older people remember
• supportive environments aid memory

21
Dementia

• Dementiairreversible loss of intellectual
  functioning caused by organic brain disease
• Symptoms
• confusion and forgetfulness
• More common with age
• More than 70 diseases can cause dementia
• Difficult to diagnose

22
Alzheimers Disease

• Disorder characterized by proliferation of
  plaques and tangles
• abnormalities in cerebral cortex that destroy
  brain functioning
• Plagues formed from protein called B-amyloid
• Tangles are twisted mass of protein threads
  within cells

23
Risk Factors for Alzheimers

• Gender, ethnicity, and especially age affect odds
  of developing it
• women at greater risk than men
• more common in North America and Europe than in
  Japan and China
• less common among Asian Americans than European
  Americans

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Risk Factors for Alzheimers, cont.

• Age is chief risk factor
• incidence rises from about 1 in 100 at age 65 to
  1 in 5 over age 85
• Alzheimers is partly genetic
• ALZHSvariant of the ApoE gene (allele
  4)increases risk
• in United States, 20 percent inherit ApoE4 from
  one parent thus, have a 50/50 chance of
  developing disease by age 80

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Risk Factors for Alzheimers, cont.

• Factors decreasing risk
• allele ApoE2 dissipates protein that causes
  plaques
• lifestyle habits (e.g. physical exercise and
  mental activity) said to be protective

26
Stages From Confusion to Death

• Stage 1
• general forgetfulness
• Stage 2
• more general confusion
• noticeable differences in concentration and
  short-term memory
• speech can be aimless or repetitive

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Stages From Confusion to Death, cont.

• Stage 3
• memory loss becomes truly dangerous
• no longer able to take care of own basic needs
• Stage 4
• need for full-time care as cannot care for self
  or respond normally
• occasionally irrationally angry or paranoid

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Stages From Confusion to Death, cont.

• Stage 5
• completely mute
• unable to respond with any action or emotion
• death usually occurs 10 to 15 years after onset

29
Many Strokes

• Vascular Dementia or Multi-Infarct Dementia
• characterized by sporadic, progressive, loss of
  intellectual functioning
• temporary obstruction of blood vessels prevent
  sufficient supply of blood to brain commonly
  called a stroke, or ministroke
• common cause is arteriosclerosis
• different progression than that of Alzheimers

30
Subcortical Dementias

• Begin with motor ability impairments and later
  produce cognitive impairment
• Parkinsons disease most common
• degeneration of neurons in area of brain that
  produces dopamine, neurotransmitter essential to
  normal brain functioning
• majority of newly diagnosed over 60

31
Subcortical Dementias, cont.

• Other Dementias
• Huntingtons disease
• multiple schlerosis
• Toxins and infectious agents can cause dementia
• syphilis
• AIDS
• psychoactive drugs

32
Reversible Dementia

• From Overmedication
• drug management difficult for older adults living
  at home who typically consume 5 or more different
  drugs a day
• From Undernourishment
• can cause vitamin deficiencies which lead to
• depression
• confusion
• cognitive decline

33
Psychological Illness

• Anxiety, antisocial personality and bipolar
  disorders, schizophrenia, depression
• less common among the elderly
• higher mortality rates for people with those
  illnesses
• illnesses themselves become less severe in later
  life
• Mental illness can produce what seems like
  dementia but is not
• e.g., depression, anxiety
• careful diagnosis can differentiate

34
New Cognitive Development in Later Life

• Theorists believe older adults can develop
• new interests
• patterns of thought
• deeper wisdom
• Aesthetic Sense and Creativity
• many older people gain appreciation of nature and
  of aesthetic experience
• as for people already creative, they generally
  continue to be productive often experiencing
  renewed inspiration

35
The Life Review

• Many older people do a life reviewthe
  examination of ones own past life
• helps older people connect their own lives with
  the future as they tell their stories to younger
  generations
• renews links with past generations, as older
  people remember ancestors
• process is more social than solitary
• crucial to self-worth that others recognize its
  significance

36
Wisdom

• Are older people typically wiser?
• But first, what is wisdom?
• broad, practical, comprehensive approach to
  lifes problems, reflecting timeless truths
• expertise in life fundamentals, permitting
  exceptional insight and judgment in complex and
  uncertain matters
• Research found little correlation between wisdom
  and age, although attributes like humor,
  perspective, altruism may increase