Mair, A. orcid.org/0000-0002-0024-2582, Poirier, M. and Conway, M.A. (2024) Nonepisodic autobiographical memory details reflect attempts to tell a good story. Psychology and Aging, 39 (4). pp. 391-399. ISSN 0882-7974
Abstract
A persistent finding in the autobiographical memory (AM) literature is that older adults report more nonepisodic (or generalized/semantic) information than young adults. Since studies are usually focused on memory for episodic (or specific) autobiographical events, the reason for the age difference in nonepisodic AM remains understudied. This experiment investigated whether the higher rate of nonepisodic AM in older adults reflects (a) a difference incommunicative preferences or (b) cognitive decline, by way of either an inhibition deficit or as a means of compensating for a deficit in episodic AM. A sample of 54 young (N = 28, age range = 18–46) and older (N = 26, age range = 62–86) participants retrieved the same AM twice, under two different sets of instructions: to tell a good story for their autobiography, or to provide a detailed police witness statement. Both groups reported more general details when they were aiming to tell a good story. In addition, older adults also reported fewer specific details when the aim was to tell a good story. In a separate ranking task, young and older adults differed in their perceptions of what makes a good story; young adults ranked “detail,” “grammar,” and “full descriptions” more highly than older adults, whereas older ranked “linking ideas” and “explaining not just describing” more highly than young adults. The results suggest that age-related differences in nonepisodic AM might be explained by communicative preferences rather than cognitive decline.
Metadata
Item Type: | Article |
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Authors/Creators: |
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Copyright, Publisher and Additional Information: | © 2024 The Author(s). This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License (CC BY 4.0; http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0). This license permits copying and redistributing the work in any medium or format, as well as adapting the material for any purpose, even commercially. |
Keywords: | autobiographical memory, episodic memory, personal semantics, ageing |
Dates: |
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Institution: | The University of Leeds |
Academic Units: | The University of Leeds > Faculty of Medicine and Health (Leeds) > School of Psychology (Leeds) |
Depositing User: | Symplectic Publications |
Date Deposited: | 01 Feb 2024 16:16 |
Last Modified: | 07 Oct 2024 12:10 |
Status: | Published |
Publisher: | American Psychological Association |
Identification Number: | 10.1037/pag0000805 |
Related URLs: | |
Open Archives Initiative ID (OAI ID): | oai:eprints.whiterose.ac.uk:208500 |