OVERCOMING SEMANTIC INTERFERENCE - AGE EFFECT

Semantic interference is found when two classes of potential verbal reactions represent the same semantic category and become competitive as to the aim and/or context of an utterance. The most common, classic interference phenomenon of this type is the so-called 'Stroop effect' which has been widely applied in the study of aging and cognitive control. This paper first presents various developmental aspects of the phenomenon of semantic interference and then recalls some empirical studies, as well as two main theoretical explanations according to changes in Stroop performance with advanced age: the general slowdown hypothesis, and the cognitive inhibition hypothesis. The authoress' own studies on age differences in the performance of the Polish version of the Stroop interference test are presented and their results discussed. Different age-related performance patterns for the younger, middle-aged, and older participants on the two parts of an interference naming subtask were found, which extends the existing findings. The more inhibition demanded by alternate naming and reading subtasks appeared not to cause a qualitatively different kind of processing though lengthening with age. The findings support rather a general slowdown than an inhibitory breakdown explanation