Psychological Development and Education ›› 2024, Vol. 40 ›› Issue (4): 457-467.doi: 10.16187/j.cnki.issn1001-4918.2024.04.01

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Distinct Effects of Working Memory Load in Aging of Word Comprehension and Production

XU Ningning1, ZHANG Minhui1, WU Hanlin1,2, ZHANG Qingfang1   

  1. 1. Department of Psychology, Renmin University of China, Beijing 100872;
    2. Department of Linguistics and Modern Languages, The Chinese University of Hong Kong, Hong Kong 999077
  • Published:2024-08-27

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Abstract: The decline of human language ability is probably affected by language-universal factors and language-specific factors, and the aging of language comprehension and production presents distinct patterns. However, most studies investigated the contribution of language-specific factors in aging of language processing. The current study aims to investigate how working memory load, as one of general cognitive abilities, affects the aging of lexical comprehension and production. In a dual-task paradigm, young and older adults were required to complete a lexical decision (or a lexical production) task as well as a number string recall task. Excluding the influence of other general cognitive abilities such as processing speed, our results showed that older adults presented longer latencies than young adults in lexical decision and lexical production tasks, indicating an age-related decline in language processing. Critically, the aging effect in lexical decision was larger than lexical production, indicating an asymmetrical pattern in word comprehension and production tasks. Our findings reveal that working memory load (as a language-universal factor) and specific language task (as a language-specific factor) affect aging of word processing together.

Key words: cognitive aging, dual-task paradigm, working memory load, word comprehension, word production

CLC Number: 

  • B844
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