Biomedical subjects

Susan Kemper

Publications and source records attributed to Susan Kemper.

15 recordsLinked to original sources

PubMed2006

Eye movements of young and older adults while reading with distraction.

The authors used eye-tracking technology to examine young and older adults' online performance in the reading in distraction paradigm. Participants read target sentences and answered comprehension questions following each sentence. In some sentences, single-word distracters were presented in either italic or red font. Distracters could be related or unrelated to the target text. Online measures, including probability of fixation, fixation duration, and number of fixations to distracting text, revealed no age differences in text processing. However, young adults did have an advantage over older adults in overall reading time and text comprehension. These results provide no support for an inhibition deficit account of age differences in the reading in distraction paradigm, but are consistent with J. Dywan and W. E. Murphy's (1996) suggestion that older adults are less able than the young to distinguish target and distracter information held in working memory.

Adult↗

PubMed2006

Revealing language deficits following stroke: the cost of doing two things at once.

The costs of doing two things were assessed for a group of healthy older adults and older adults who were tested at least 6 months after a stroke. A baseline language sample was compared to language samples collected while the participants were performing concurrent motor tasks or selective ignoring tasks. Whereas the healthy older adults showed few costs due to the concurrent task demands, the language samples from the stroke survivors were disrupted by the demands of doing two things at once. The dual task measures reveal long-lasting effects of strokes that were not evident when stroke survivors were assessed using standard clinical tools.

Aged↗

PubMed2006

Age differences in memory-load interference effects in syntactic processing.

The effects of a memory load on syntactic processing by younger and older adults were examined. Participants were asked to remember a noun phrase (NP) memory load while they read sentences varying in syntactic complexity. Two types of NPs were used as memory loads: proper names or definite descriptions referring to occupations or roles. The NPs used in the sentence and memory load either matched (e.g., all proper names or all occupations), or they mismatched. Participants read complex sentences more slowly than they did simpler sentences; for young adults, this complexity effect was exacerbated when memory interference was generated by matching NPs in the sentence and memory load, whereas for older adults, memory-load interference did not vary with sentence complexity or memory-load matching. These results suggest that a general reduction in older adults' processing capacity was produced by the memory load, whereas the matching memory loads and sentence NPs produced a more specific form of interference that affected young adults' online processing.

Adult↗

PubMed2005

Different effects of dual task demands on the speech of young and older adults.

Young and older adults provided language samples in response to elicitation questions while concurrently performing 3 different tasks. The language samples were scored on three dimensions: fluency, grammatical complexity, and content. Previous research had suggested the hypothesis that the restricted speech register of older adults is buffered from the costs of dual task demands. This hypothesis was tested by comparing language samples collected during a baseline condition with those produced while the participants were performing the concurrent tasks. The results indicate that young and older adults adopt different strategies when confronted with dual task demands. Young adults shift to a restricted speech register when confronted with dual task demands. Older adults, who were already using a restricted speech register, became less fluent although the grammatical complexity and informational content of their speech was preserved. Hence, some but not all aspects of older adults' speech are buffered from dual task demands.

Journal Article↗

PubMed2005

Enhancing communication with older adults: overcoming elderspeak.

Because communication behaviors are difficult to change, practicing speech without elderspeak is helpful in preparing for actual clinical situations. The Communication Enhancement Model describes potential benefits of eliminating elderspeak in speech to older adults. Minimizing the use of elderspeak is hypothesized to reduce stereotype-based messages that older adults are incompetent and dependent. An improved communication environment promotes the cognitive and functional abilities of older adults. Achieving optimal communication environments may contribute to higher levels of well-being for older adults and to increased quality of life. Young adult care providers also may benefit from increased job satisfaction if they relate closely with care recipients.

Aged↗

PubMed2004

Eye-fixation patterns of high- and low-span young and older adults: down the garden path and back again.

Young and older adults' eye fixations were monitored as they read sentences with temporary ambiguities such as "The experienced soldiers warned about the dangers conducted the midnight raid." Their fixation patterns were similar except that older adults made many regressions. In a 2nd experiment, high- and low-span older adults were compared with high- and low-span young adults. Pint-pass fixations were similar, except low-span readers made many regressions and their total fixation times were longer. High-span readers also used the focus operator "only" (e.g., "Only experienced soldiers warned about the dangers.") to immediately resolve the temporary ambiguities. No age group differences were observed. These results are discussed with reference to theories of the role of working memory in sentence processing.

Adult↗

PubMed2004

Sentence production by young and older adults in controlled contexts.

In this experiment we compared young and older adults' abilities to produce complex sentences under controlled conditions. We asked participants to memorize sentence stems differing in syntactical complexity and then to produce a complete sentence using the stem. The length, complexity, and content of young adults' responses varied with the syntactical complexity of the stems, whereas older adults' responses did not. These results suggest that working memory processing limitations impose a "ceiling" on older adults' production of complex sentences, limiting their length, complexity, and content.

Adolescent↗

PubMed2004

Enhancing communication with older adults: overcoming elderspeak.

Gerontological nurses promote health and successful aging for a growing population of older adults. Care providers unknowingly may communicate messages of dependence, incompetence, and control to older adults by using elderspeak, a speech style similar to baby talk, that fails to communicate appropriate respect. This article describes a communication training program that significantly reduced the use of elderspeak by nursing assistants and led t more respectful, less controlling, and equally as caring communication between nursing assistants and nursing home residents. Strategies to use in evaluating and enhancing interpersonal communication with older clients are provided. Therapeutic communication is a critical tool for nurses who provide health care to the growing populati of older adults.

Aged↗

PubMed2003

The costs of doing two things at once for young and older adults: talking while walking, finger tapping, and ignoring speech or noise.

Young and older adults provided language samples in response to questions while walking, finger tapping, and ignoring speech or noise. The language samples were scored on 3 dimensions: fluency, complexity, and content. The hypothesis that working memory limitations affect speech production by older adults was tested by comparing baseline samples with those produced while the participants were performing the concurrent tasks. There were baseline differences: Older adults' speech was less fluent and less complex than young adults' speech. Young adults adopted a different strategy in response to the dual-task demands than older adults: They reduced sentence length and grammatical complexity. In contrast, older adults shifted to a reduced speech rate in the dual-task conditions.

Adolescent↗

PubMed2003

Written language clues to cognitive changes of aging: an analysis of the letters of King James VI/I.

Reductions in language complexity normally occur in older adults because of decreased working memory and rate of language processing. Comparative measures can reveal whether linguistic change is due to normal aging or dementia. Linguistic analysis of a series of letters of King James, 1566-1625, investigate whether he exhibited a normative or atypical pattern of change. Fifty-seven letters from the years 1604 to 1624 were analyzed. Data modeling reveals a quadratic pattern of decline in written language complexity with increased diversity of vocabulary corresponding to historical reports of illness around 1618-1619. This investigation demonstrates how language analysis can provide valuable insight to normal and pathological cognitive changes of aging as well as to the understanding of historical figures.

Aging↗

PubMed2003

Age differences in sentence production.

Two experiments have been completed using experimental techniques to study language production under controlled conditions. In Experiment 1, young and older adults were given two, three, or four words and asked to compose a sentence. Older adults' responses were similar to those of young adults when given two or three words. When given four words, the older adults made more errors and their responses were shorter and less elaborate than those of the young adults. In Experiment 2, simple intransitive verbs (smiled), transitive verbs (replaced), and complement-taking verbs (expected) were contrasted. The responses of older adults were similar to those of young adults given intransitive and transitive verbs. Given complement-taking verbs, young adults produced complex sentences, whereas the older adults produced simpler, less complex sentences; the older adults also made many errors. Both experiments found that older adults respond more slowly than young adults.

Adolescent↗

PubMed2003

Improving nursing home communication: an intervention to reduce elderspeak.

PURPOSE: Opportunities for social interaction are lacking within today's nursing homes and staff frequently communicate messages of dependence, incompetence, and control to residents. This study evaluated a brief educational program designed to increase staff awareness of intergenerational speech modifications such as elderspeak and strategies to enhance communication. DESIGN AND METHODS: A communication-training program was provided to Certified Nursing Assistants (CNAs; n = 20) in five nursing homes. Audio recordings of staff interacting with residents before and after training were transcribed, coded, and compared on features of elderspeak. RESULTS: After the training, CNAs reduced their use of elderspeak including terms of endearment, inappropriate collective pronouns, and shortened sentence length. In addition, the emotional tone of staff speech with residents was rated as less controlling and more respectful after the training while caring qualities were maintained. Speech rate did not change significantly. IMPLICATIONS: Teaching CNAs to reduce elderspeak holds promise as an approach to improving the social environment in nursing homes.

Adolescent↗

PubMedDate not supplied

Oral and written language in late adulthood: findings from the Nun Study.

As a part of the Nun Study, a longitudinal investigation of aging and Alzheimer's disease, oral and written autobiographies from 118 older women were analyzed to examine the relationship between spoken and written language. The written language samples were more complex than the oral samples, both conceptually and grammatically. The relationship between the linguistic measures and participant characteristics was also examined. The results suggest that the grammatical and conceptual characteristics of oral and written language are affected by participant differences in education, cognitive status, and physical function and that written language samples have greater power than oral language samples to differentiate between high- and low-ability older adults.

Aged↗

PubMedDate not supplied

The time course of metonymic language text processing by older and younger adults.

The influence of aging on the processing of figurative language was investigated by utilizing Frisson and Pickering's (Journal of Experimental Psychology: Learning, Memory, and Cognition, 25, 1366-1383, 1999) paradigm, monitoring eye fixation times to target words in sentences. First fixation times and total fixation times were analyzed for familiar and unfamiliar metonymies and literal control sentences. Frisson and Pickering found that processing figurative and literal expressions yielded similar patterns of eye fixations. In the current study, these methods and results were replicated and extended to include older adults' processing of metonymies. This investigation replicated their findings for young adults and found that older adults produced the same processing patterns as the younger adults.

Adult↗

PubMedDate not supplied

Aging, encoding, and word retrieval: distinguishing phonological and memory processes.

Word retrieval deficits are one of the most common complaints among older adults. The Transmission Deficit Hypothesis predicts that phonologically similar names would be harder for older adults to encode and retrieve. Results indicated that overall older adults encoded and recalled fewer words than younger adults when given only one trial and when given multiple trials to criterion. For both experiments, proper names were more difficult to retrieve than common nouns, and phonologically similar words were more difficult to retrieve than phonologically different words for both older and younger adults. Age differences were not evident for retrieving phonologically similar items or names but older adults did need more trials to encode phonologically similar items and names. Age differences for phonologically similar items and names appear related to encoding processes with retrieval of these items consistently hard for both older and younger adults.

Adolescent↗