A Meta-Analytic Review of Prospective Memory and Aging

Abstract

A meta-analysis of prospective memory (PM) studies revealed that in laboratory settings younger participants outperform older participants on tests of both time- and event-based PM (rs = -.39 and -.34. respectively). Event-based PM tasks that impose higher levels of controlled strategic demand are associated with significantly larger age effects than event-based PM tasks that are supported by relatively more automatic processes (rs = -.40 vs. -.14, respectively). However, contrary to the prevailing view in the literature, retrospective memory as measured by free recall is associated with significantly greater age-related decline (r = -.52) than PM, and older participants perform substantially better than their younger counterparts in naturalistic PM studies (rs = .35 and .52 for event- and time-based PM, respectively).