2006 Fiscal Year Final Research Report Summary
Age-related changes on the mechanism to control visual attention
| Project/Area Number |
16091205
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| Research Category |
Grant-in-Aid for Scientific Research on Priority Areas
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| Allocation Type | Single-year Grants |
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| Review Section |
Science and Engineering
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| Research Institution | Osaka University |
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Principal Investigator |
MIURA Toshiaki Osaka University, Graduate School of Human Sciences, Professor (00116104)
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| Co-Investigator(Kenkyū-buntansha) |
SHINOHARA Kazumitsu Osaka university, Graduate School of Human Sciences, Associate Professor (60260642)
KIMURA Takahiko Osaka university, Graduate School of Human Sciences, Assistant Professor (80379221)
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| Project Period (FY) |
2004 – 2006
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| Keywords | attention / aging / function of inhibition / questionnaire |
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| Research Abstract |
It is well known that the distracters on search display have an interference effect when the observer searched a target. This indicates that the configuration of search display has relation with the userfriendliness and the accessibility of IT devices. It is very important for appropriate design of interfaces to clarify agerelated changes in cognitive functions. Therefore, we investigated the agerelated changes on visual attention, especially inhibition function. Two approaches were adopted : a visual search task and a questionnaire method. In the visual search task, an onset distracter stimulus which was irrelevant for detecting a target was used. The result showed that a sensitivity of detection task (d') for elderly people decreased when an irrelevant stimulus was presented. This indicated that the focusing of attention became difficult for the elderly people by the onset distracter because of capture of attention exogenously. Furthermore, the relationship between the subjective and the objective evaluation of cognitive function in elderly people were examined by using the questionnaire involving memory capacity and attention function. A possible explanation for the results of both different tasks in this study is the agerelated deterioration of central executive function.
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