Date created: | Last Updated:

Category: Project

Description: The project aims to assess how language comprehension is influenced by age and how age effects can be modulated by sentence context. To examine this younger (18-35 yrs) and older (65-80yrs) adults will complete a self paced reading task where sentences will have varied contexts (sentence contexts either match, mismatch or are neutral to the target word). The time it takes to respond to the target word (i.e. press the spacebar) will measure participants’ comprehension of the sentences. The second aim is to determine whether task demand also modulates age effects during language comprehension. To assess this both age groups will either simply read the sentences or answer questions after reading the sentences. Questions will either be based on the context or the target word in the sentence. Again, the time taken to respond to the target word will measure participant comprehension. The number of correct answers to questions will measure accuracy.