Aging and posture in the memory of manipulable objects

ABSTRACT

Thirty healthy elderly participants (mean age = 77.3) learned the names of manipulable and nonmanipulable objects while adopting a control posture (hands in front of them) or an interfering posture (holding their hands behind their back). Results on a recall task showed a postural interference (PI) effect, with the interfering posture reducing the memory of manipulable objects, but not of nonmanipulable ones. The effect was similar to the Postural Interference effect previously observed in young adults, although with a lower performance. These results call into question the embodied theory hypothesis that the deterioration of memory in aging is related to the decline of the sensorimotor system.

KEYWORDS:

• Grounded cognition
• Long Term Memory
• Action
• Concept

Acknowledgments

The authors would like to thank Judith Benovici for her help in data collection.

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the authors.

Additional information

Funding

The work was supported by Grant ANR-13-APPR-0009 to Valérie Gyselinck from the French National Research Agency (ANR).