Academic Journal
Age-related differences in the role of explicit encoding instructions on verbal, visual and spatial Hebb learning.
| Τίτλος: | Age-related differences in the role of explicit encoding instructions on verbal, visual and spatial Hebb learning. |
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| Συγγραφείς: | Leach H; Cardiff University, Cardiff, Wales, United Kingdom. Electronic address: leachhj@cardiff.ac.uk., Guitard D; Cardiff University, Cardiff, Wales, United Kingdom. Electronic address: guitardd@cardiff.ac.uk. |
| Πηγή: | Cognition [Cognition] 2026 Dec; Vol. 277, pp. 106691. Date of Electronic Publication: 2026 Aug 20. |
| Τύπος έκδοσης: | Journal Article |
| Γλώσσα: | English |
| Στοιχεία περιοδικού: | Publisher: Elsevier Country of Publication: Netherlands NLM ID: 0367541 Publication Model: Print-Electronic Cited Medium: Internet ISSN: 1873-7838 (Electronic) Linking ISSN: 00100277 NLM ISO Abbreviation: Cognition Subsets: MEDLINE |
| Imprint Name(s): | Publication: Amsterdam : Elsevier Original Publication: Hague, Mouton. |
| Ιατρικοί όροι (MeSH): | Aging*/physiology , Mental Recall*/physiology , Serial Learning*/physiology , Verbal Learning*/physiology , Spatial Learning*/physiology, Awareness/physiology ; Humans ; Aged ; Young Adult ; Female ; Male ; Adult ; Cues ; Middle Aged ; Age Factors ; Adolescent |
| Περίληψη: | Hebb repetition learning - the improved recall performance for repeated sequences compared to non-repeated sequences - is widely used as a laboratory measure of learning. Recent research has demonstrated that awareness of the repeated sequence enhances learning, although there is reason to believe that older adults may not benefit from such foreknowledge in the same way as younger adults. In three experiments, we systematically investigated the role of foreknowledge in younger and older adults, across verbal, visual and spatial Hebb repetition learning. Each experiment employed a serial recall task (of letters, Chinese characters or dot locations), in which a repeated sequence was presented on every third trial. Half of the participants received foreknowledge - they were informed that a repeated sequence would occur and were signalled the presence prior to its presentation. The remaining participants received no foreknowledge and were not explicitly made aware of the repeated sequence. We compared learning rates between younger and older adults, in both foreknowledge and no foreknowledge conditions. Across all experiments, we found comparable Hebb learning between younger and older adults in the no foreknowledge condition. However, the foreknowledge condition revealed that the additional cue provided substantially greater benefit for learning the repeated sequence in younger adults compared to older adults. We suggest this pattern reflects older adults' difficulties in forming associations, in this case, between the foreknowledge cue and the repeated sequence, which limits their ability to use the cue to enhance learning. (Copyright © 2026 The Authors. Published by Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.) |
| Competing Interests: | Declaration of competing interest The authors declare no conflicts of interest with respect to this article. The sample size in all three experiments was based on Bayesian ANOVAs using the slope data (the slope of the proportion of correct responses across blocks for both repeated and non-repeated trials). Analyses were conducted individually for the younger and older adults. Condition (repeated vs. non-repeated) was a within-participant factor and knowledge group (foreknowledge vs. no foreknowledge) was the between-participant factor in the Bayesian ANOVA. Default priors were used via the BayesFactor package (Morey & Rouder, 2023). This analysis was used only for the sample size, after which Bayesian linear mixed-effects models were used. To aid interpretation of the five-way interactions, we present the posterior distributions of the age-group difference in the foreknowledge benefit (younger adults – older adults) across the three experiments. Solid vertical lines represent posterior medians, horizontal bars represent 95% highest-density intervals, and the dashed vertical lines represent zero. Across all three experiments, younger adults demonstrate a greater foreknowledge benefit than older adults, with the strongest effect in the verbal domain, and a weaker but consistent effect in the visual domain. |
| Contributed Indexing: | Keywords: Aging; Awareness; Foreknowledge; Hebb repetition learning; Serial recall |
| Entry Date(s): | Date Created: 20260820 Date Completed: 20260906 Latest Revision: 20260906 |
| Update Code: | 20260907 |
| DOI: | 10.1016/j.cognition.2026.106691 |
| PMID: | 42623953 |
| Βάση Δεδομένων: | MEDLINE |
| ISSN: | 1873-7838 |
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| DOI: | 10.1016/j.cognition.2026.106691 |