Institute of Neuroscience & Psychology, University of Glasgow, Glasgow, Scotland.
School of Education, National and Kapodistrian University of Athens, Athens, Greece.
Neuropsychol Rev. 2022 Jun;32(2):438-457. doi: 10.1007/s11065-021-09505-4. Epub 2021 Apr 22.
Young adults exhibit a small asymmetry of visuospatial attention that favours the left side of space relative to the right (pseudoneglect). However, it remains unclear whether this leftward bias is maintained, eliminated or shifted rightward in older age. Here we present two meta-analyses that aimed to identify whether adults aged ≥50 years old display a group-level spatial attention bias, as indexed by the line bisection and the landmark tasks. A total of 69 datasets from 65 studies, involving 1654 participants, were analysed. In the meta-analysis of the line bisection task (n = 63), no bias was identified for studies where the mean age was ≥50, but there was a clear leftward bias in a subset where all individual participants were aged ≥50. There was no moderating effect of the participant's age or sex, line length, line position, nor the presence of left or right cues. There was a small publication bias in favour of reporting rightward biases. Of note, biases were slightly more leftward in studies where participants had been recruited as part of a stand-alone older group, compared to studies where participants were recruited as controls for a clinical study. Similarly, no spatial bias was observed in the meta-analysis of the landmark task, although the number of studies included was small (n = 6). Overall, these results indicate that over 50s maintain a group-level leftward bias on the line bisection task, but more studies are needed to determine whether this bias can be modulated by stimulus- or state-dependent factors.
年轻人表现出一种微小的视空间注意不对称性，即相对于右侧，空间的左侧更受偏爱（假性忽视）。然而，老年人的这种左偏优势是否保持、消除或右移仍不清楚。本文介绍了两项荟萃分析，旨在确定≥50 岁的成年人是否表现出群体水平的空间注意偏向，这可通过线二分和地标任务来衡量。总共分析了 65 项研究中的 69 个数据集，涉及 1654 名参与者。在线二分任务的荟萃分析（n = 63）中，对于平均年龄≥50 岁的研究没有发现偏向，但在一个子集的研究中，所有个体参与者的年龄均≥50 岁，存在明显的左偏。参与者的年龄或性别、线的长度、线的位置，以及左右线索的存在都没有调节作用。存在有利于报告右偏的小的发表偏倚。值得注意的是，与参与者作为临床研究对照招募的研究相比，当参与者作为独立的老年组招募时，研究中的偏向略向左。同样，地标任务的荟萃分析也没有观察到空间偏向，尽管纳入的研究数量较少（n = 6）。总体而言，这些结果表明，50 岁以上的人在线二分任务上保持着群体水平的左偏优势，但需要更多的研究来确定这种偏向是否可以通过刺激或状态相关因素来调节。
