West R L, Thorn R M
Department of Psychology, University of Florida, Gainesville, Florida, 32611-2250, USA.
Exp Aging Res. 2001 Jan-Mar;27(1):41-65. doi: 10.1080/03610730126109.
Research in field and laboratory settings has shown that goals lead to improved self-efficacy and performance, especially when individuals also receive positive feedback. The present study extended goal-setting theory to examine self-set goals and feedback in relation to younger and older adults' memory performance and self-efficacy. Following a baseline recall trial, participants completed three shopping list recall trials. Half of the participants were instructed to set goals for the three experimental trials, and half in each goal condition received performance feedback after each trial. Young adults' self-efficacy, clustering, and recall exceeded that of older adults. Goal setting increased self-efficacy for younger but not older adults, and it did not affect performance. Younger adults and participants in the feedback condition increased their goals across trials, as did participants for whom feedback indicated success. These data provide a first look at the motivational impact of feedback and self-set recall goals in memory aging. Additional study is needed to understand the interactive effects of type of feedback, memory task difficulty, and type of goal setting at different ages.
在实地和实验室环境中的研究表明，目标能提高自我效能感和表现，尤其是当个体也收到积极反馈时。本研究扩展了目标设定理论，以检验与年轻人和老年人的记忆表现及自我效能感相关的自我设定目标和反馈。在一次基线回忆试验后，参与者完成了三次购物清单回忆试验。一半的参与者被指示为这三次实验性试验设定目标，并且在每个目标条件下，有一半的参与者在每次试验后收到表现反馈。年轻人的自我效能感、聚类和回忆能力超过了老年人。目标设定提高了年轻人而非老年人的自我效能感，并且它对表现没有影响。年轻人以及处于反馈条件下的参与者在各次试验中提高了他们的目标，收到反馈表明成功的参与者也是如此。这些数据首次揭示了反馈和自我设定的回忆目标对记忆老化的激励作用。需要进一步的研究来了解不同年龄阶段反馈类型、记忆任务难度和目标设定类型的交互作用。
