Paired-associate learning in institutionalized and noninstitutionalized old people: an analysis of interference and context effects.

Groups of old people were impaired, relative to young adults, on a test of negative transfer involving lists of paired-associate words. Susceptibility to interference effects were greater in old people living in institutions than in old people living in their own homes. The effects of varying contextual cues on performance on this task were also assessed. All participants, regardless of age, benefitted from manipulations that were intrinsic to the task (e.g., relatedness of paired associates), but only the institutionalized aged responded to extrinsic contextual manipulations (e.g., environmental changes). In general, the performance of institutionalized old people resembled that of brain-damaged amnesic patients tested under similar conditions; old people living at home generally behaved more like normal, young people. The results were discussed in terms of specific age differences in cognitive function, declining brain function, and possible selective effects of institutionalization.