Mazerolle Marie, Smith Amy M, Torrance McKinzey, Thomas Ayanna K
Laboratoire de Recherches Intégratives en Neurosciences et Psychologie Cognitive & MSHE Ledoux, CNRS, Université Bourgogne Franche-Comté, Besançon, France.
Department of Psychology, Quinnipiac University, Hamden, CT, United States.
Front Psychol. 2021 Mar 10;12:628696. doi: 10.3389/fpsyg.2021.628696. eCollection 2021.
Numerous studies have documented the detrimental impact of age-based stereotype threat (ABST) on older adults' cognitive performance and especially on veridical memory. However, far fewer studies have investigated the impact of ABST on older adults' memory distortion. Here, we review the subset of research examining memory distortion and provide evidence for the role of stereotype threat as a powerful socio-emotional factor that impacts age-related susceptibility to memory distortion. In this review we define memory distortion as errors in memory that are associated with gist-based errors or source misattributions. Whereas, some of the reviewed experiments support the conclusion that ABST should be considered in the context of age-related differences in memory distortion, others reported little or no impact of stereotype threat. These discrepancies suggest that the role of ABST, and socio-emotional processes generally, in age-related changes in memory distortion are less clear. In this review, we argue that ABST does play an important role in age-related changes in memory distortion. We present evidence suggesting that discrepancies in the reviewed literature may be reconciled when evaluated in the context of the leading theories about stereotype threat: the Executive Resource Depletion hypothesis and the Regulatory Focus theory. We also discuss how differences in methodology and participant characteristics can account for a priori contradictory results in the literature. Finally, we propose some recommendations for researchers and practitioners when assessing memory in older adults.
大量研究记录了基于年龄的刻板印象威胁（ABST）对老年人认知表现的不利影响，尤其是对真实记忆的影响。然而，研究ABST对老年人记忆扭曲影响的研究要少得多。在此，我们回顾了研究记忆扭曲的部分研究，并为刻板印象威胁作为影响与年龄相关的记忆扭曲易感性的强大社会情感因素的作用提供证据。在本综述中，我们将记忆扭曲定义为与基于主旨的错误或来源错误归因相关的记忆错误。虽然，一些综述实验支持在与年龄相关的记忆扭曲差异背景下应考虑ABST的结论，但其他实验报告刻板印象威胁的影响很小或没有影响。这些差异表明，ABST以及一般社会情感过程在与年龄相关的记忆扭曲变化中的作用尚不清楚。在本综述中，我们认为ABST在与年龄相关的记忆扭曲变化中确实起着重要作用。我们提供的证据表明，当在关于刻板印象威胁的主要理论背景下进行评估时，综述文献中的差异可能会得到调和：执行资源耗竭假说和调节焦点理论。我们还讨论了方法学和参与者特征的差异如何解释文献中先验的矛盾结果。最后，我们为研究人员和从业者在评估老年人记忆时提出了一些建议。
