Adult age differences in cross-modal recoding and mental tempo, and older adults' utilization of compensatory task conditions.

Free recall performance of younger and older adults was examined in three modes of presentation: visually presented sentences, auditorily presented sentences, and bimodally (visually + auditorily) presented sentences. For all modes, the sentences were presented at slow or fast rates. The main result was a three-way interaction between age, mode, and rate. The younger adults performed at the same level in all three modes at a slow rate of presentation, and at a higher level in the bimodal task than in the unimodal tasks at a fast rate of presentation. The elderly, on the other hand, performed at the highest level in the bimodal task regardless of rate of presentation. In addition, the younger adults outperformed the elderly in all mode by rate combinations; however, attenuated age differences in recall were observed for the bimodally presented sentences at a slow presentation rate. It is suggested that the adult aging process is associated with deficits in cross-modal recoding and rate of processing. Finally, the capability of older adults to utilize compensatory task conditions is discussed.