This study investigated the time orientation of older adults in group conversations and its association with their memory functioning. We hypothesized that those with a greater ability to memorize recently accessed information would talk about more recent topics in natural conversations. To test this hypothesis, we used dictation data from older adults’ group conversations and categorized their utterances in terms of the time to which the utterances refer. While inheriting the conventional coding categories for the temporal focus of the utterances, Past, Present, and Future, this study assigned a new category, Recent, to an utterance that referred to an event within the past month to distinguish between recent and remote memories. We further classified utterances concerning whether they were experience-based or knowledge-based, based on the distinction between two types of declarative memories: episodic and semantic memories. We found that the frequency of knowledge-based utterances had significant positive associations with memory functioning if they were Recent-tagged. However, the frequency of experience-based utterances had no significant association with memory functions, irrespective of whether the sentence was Past- or Recent-tagged. Based on the results, we discussed what type of intervention program would be effective in preserving or improving memory function in older adults.

本研究调查了老年人在小组对话中的时间取向及其与记忆功能的关系。我们假设那些记忆最近访问过的信息能力更强的人会在自然对话中谈论最近的话题。为了检验这一假设，我们使用了老年人群对话中的听写数据，并根据话语所指的时间对他们的话语进行了分类。在继承过去、现在和未来这些话语的时间焦点的传统编码类别的同时，这项研究分配了一个新的类别，最近的，指代过去一个月内发生的事件的话语，以区分最近和遥远的记忆。我们进一步分类关于它们是基于经验还是基于知识的话语，基于两种类型的陈述性记忆之间的区别：情景记忆和语义记忆。我们发现，基于知识的话语的频率如果带有最近标记，则与记忆功能有显着的正相关。然而，基于经验的话语频率与记忆功能没有显着关联，无论句子是过去标记还是最近标记。根据结果​​，我们讨论了哪种类型的干预计划可以有效地保持或改善老年人的记忆功能。基于经验的话语频率与记忆功能没有显着关联，无论句子是过去标记还是最近标记。根据结果​​，我们讨论了哪种类型的干预计划可以有效地保持或改善老年人的记忆功能。基于经验的话语频率与记忆功能没有显着关联，无论句子是过去标记还是最近标记。根据结果​​，我们讨论了哪种类型的干预计划可以有效地保持或改善老年人的记忆功能。