ABSTRACT

Although it is known that aging impairs episodic memory, the precise effect of aging on emotional memory is not fully understood. In this study, younger and older adults listened to narratives that contained general and emotional (positive, negative, or neutral) details as they viewed related images. When participants later recalled the narratives, both age groups remembered more emotional details from the negative than the positive or neutral narratives. Interestingly, the enhanced recall for the negative narratives came with a reduced ability to remember the associated images for both younger and older adults. For all narrative types, older adults recalled a similar number of general but fewer emotional details than younger adults. Although there were no age-specific emotional effects, memory functioning of the older adults related to better recall of the positive narratives and associated images. These results provide insight into the similarities and differences in how younger and older adults encode and retrieve complex emotional memories.

摘要

虽然已知衰老会损害情景记忆，但衰老对情绪记忆的确切影响尚不完全清楚。在这项研究中，年轻人和老年人在观看相关图像时会聆听包含一般和情感（正面、负面或中性）细节的叙述。当参与者后来回忆这些叙述时，两个年龄组都比正面或中性的叙述更能记住负面的情感细节。有趣的是，对负面叙述的回忆增强伴随着年轻人和老年人记住相关图像的能力下降。对于所有叙事类型，与年轻人相比，老年人回忆起的一般性细节数量相似，但情感细节较少。虽然没有特定年龄的情绪影响，老年人的记忆功能与更好地回忆积极的叙述和相关图像有关。这些结果让我们深入了解年轻人和老年人在编码和检索复杂情感记忆方面的异同。