Brad Sutton | PubMed Health

PubMed2006

Decreased neural specialization in old adults on a working memory task.

Compelling evidence shows that there is decreased neural specialization in the ventral visual cortex in older adults under passive viewing conditions. We assessed whether such specialization would be maintained on a working memory task and whether decreased specialization co-occurred with increased prefrontal activations. Participants encoded three faces or houses and maintained the set across an 8-s interval. Results provided evidence for less specialization of faces and houses in older adults than in younger adults, while the middle and inferior frontal cortex showed increased activation in elders compared with the young.

Adolescent↗

PubMed2006

Age-related changes in object processing and contextual binding revealed using fMR adaptation.

Using fMR adaptation, we studied the effects of aging on the neural processing of passively viewed naturalistic pictures composed of a prominent object against a background scene. Spatially distinct neural regions showing specific patterns of adaptation to objects, background scenes, and contextual integration (binding) were identified in young adults. Older adults did not show adaptation responses corresponding to binding in the medial-temporal areas. They also showed an adaptation deficit for objects whereby their lateral occipital complex (LOC) did not adapt to repeated objects in the context of a changing background. The LOC could be activated, however, when objects were presented without a background. Moreover, the adaptation deficit for objects viewed against backgrounds was reversed when elderly subjects were asked to attend to objects while viewing these complex pictures. These findings suggest that the elderly have difficulty with simultaneous processing of objects and backgrounds that, in turn, could contribute to deficient contextual binding.

Adult↗