Thirst for knowledge: The effects of curiosity and interest on memory in younger and older adults.
Open Access
- 1 December 2015
- journal article
- Published by American Psychological Association (APA) in Psychology and Aging
- Vol. 30 (4), 835-841
- https://doi.org/10.1037/a0039801
Abstract
Given age-related memory impairments, one's level of curiosity or interest could enhance memory for certain information. In the current study, younger and older adults read trivia questions, rated how curious they were to learn each answer, provided confidence and interest ratings, and judgments of learning after learning the answer. No age-related differences in memory were found. Analyses indicated that curiosity and interest contributed to the formation of judgments of learning. Additionally, interest had a unique increasing relationship with older, but not younger, adults' memory performance after a one-week delay. The results suggest that subjective interest may serve to enhance older adults' memory.Keywords
Funding Information
- National Institutes of Health (R01AG044335)
- Sponsor name not included (CIG630680)
- Japan Society for the Promotion of Science KAKENHI (15H05401)
This publication has 21 references indexed in Scilit:
- Selecting valuable information to remember: Age-related differences and similarities in self-regulated learning.Psychology and Aging, 2013
- Metacognition in Later AdulthoodCurrent Directions in Psychological Science, 2011
- Money enhances memory consolidation – But only for boring materialCognition, 2011
- The Wick in the Candle of LearningPsychological Science, 2009
- Aging and Selective Engagement: The Moderating Impact of Motivation on Older Adults' Resource UtilizationThe Journals of Gerontology, Series B: Psychological Sciences and Social Sciences, 2009
- Motivational Influences on Controlled Processing: Moderating Distractibility in Older AdultsAging, Neuropsychology, and Cognition, 2007
- Goal-directed memory: The role of cognitive control in older adults' emotional memory.Psychology and Aging, 2005
- Cognitive and neural mechanisms of emotional memoryTrends in Cognitive Sciences, 2001
- Motivation and representational processes in adulthood: The effects of social accountability and information relevance.Psychology and Aging, 2001
- Memory and the hippocampus: A synthesis from findings with rats, monkeys, and humans.Psychological Review, 1992