de Wijk R A, Cain W S
John B. Pierce Laboratory, New Haven, Connecticut.
Percept Psychophys. 1994 Jul;56(1):12-8. doi: 10.3758/bf03211686.
Eighty-two adults, ranging in age from young to elderly, performed odor-quality discrimination and both free and cued identification on six odorants presented at two intensity levels. The odorants simulated the real-world substances banana, licorice, cherry/almond, wintergreen, clove, and lemon. Performance on all three tasks declined with age, but improved with stimulus intensity. Performance at discrimination benefited from the mere availability of the six names during testing. Performance in cued identification far exceeded that in free identification and, for young and middle-aged adults, fell close to that for discrimination. For elderly adults, however, performance in cued identification fell substantially below that in discrimination. Although not entirely free of cognitive influences, discrimination seems to offer particularly clear resolution of alterations in olfactory functioning.
82名年龄从青年到老年的成年人，对两种强度水平下呈现的六种气味剂进行了气味质量辨别以及自由和提示识别。这些气味剂模拟了现实世界中的物质，如香蕉、甘草、樱桃/杏仁、冬青油、丁香和柠檬。在所有这三项任务中，表现均随年龄增长而下降，但随刺激强度提高而改善。辨别任务的表现受益于测试期间六种气味名称的简单呈现。提示识别的表现远远超过自由识别，对于青年和中年成年人来说，接近辨别任务的表现。然而，对于老年人来说，提示识别的表现大幅低于辨别任务。尽管并非完全不受认知影响，但辨别似乎能特别清晰地分辨嗅觉功能的变化。
