Department of Psychology, University of California, Los Angeles, Los Angeles, CA 90095-1563, USA.
Dev Psychol. 2011 Nov;47(6):1553-64. doi: 10.1037/a0025623. Epub 2011 Sep 26.
Although attentional control and memory change considerably across the life span, no research has examined how the ability to strategically remember important information (i.e., value-directed remembering) changes from childhood to old age. The present study examined this in different age groups across the life span (N = 320, 5-96 years old). A selectivity task was used in which participants were asked to study and recall items worth different point values in order to maximize their point score. This procedure allowed for measures of memory quantity/capacity (number of words recalled) and memory efficiency/selectivity (the recall of high-value items relative to low-value items). Age-related differences were found for memory capacity, as young adults recalled more words than the other groups. However, in terms of selectivity, younger and older adults were more selective than adolescents and children. The dissociation between these measures across the life span illustrates important age-related differences in terms of memory capacity and the ability to selectively remember high-value information.
尽管注意力控制和记忆在整个生命周期中发生了很大的变化，但没有研究考察过从儿童期到老年期，人们有策略地记住重要信息（即有价值导向的记忆）的能力是如何变化的。本研究在不同年龄组的整个生命周期中（N=320，5-96 岁）研究了这一问题。使用了一种选择性任务，要求参与者学习和回忆具有不同分值的项目，以最大限度地提高他们的分数。该程序允许测量记忆数量/容量（回忆的单词数量）和记忆效率/选择性（与低值项目相比，回忆高值项目的数量）。研究发现，记忆容量与年龄有关，年轻人比其他组回忆的单词更多。然而，在选择性方面，年轻和年长的成年人比青少年和儿童更具选择性。这些跨生命周期的措施之间的分离说明了在记忆容量和有选择性地记住高值信息的能力方面，与年龄相关的重要差异。
