Elaborations in Adults' Text Recall: Relations to Working Memory and Text Recall

Abstract

We examined differences in the elaborative statements produced by younger (mean age = 22.19) and older (mean age = 76.56) adults during text recall as well as relations between elaborative statements and text recall and working memory. Three types of elaborative statements were examined: personal (reactions to a text), inferential (inferences derivable about a text), and metacognitive (statements concerning understanding or memory of a text). Older adults made more personal elaborations during text recall than did younger adults. Younger and older adults did not differ in the amount of inferential or metacognitive elaborations they made, although all adults made more metacognitive comments when texts contained problematic information. Personal elaborations were negatively related to recall and accounted for a substantial portion of the age-related variance in recall. Personal elaborations were also negatively related to processing efficiency, and relations between personal elaborations and working memory and storage capacity were mediated by processing efficiency. The results are consistent with the view that an age-related increase in non-goal-path thoughts, due to inhibitory problems or a different style of text processing, may be related to age-related deficits in text processing.