EFFECTIVENESS OF SELF-GENERATED CUES IN EARLY ALZHEIMERS-DISEASE

The ability to utilize cognitive support in the form of self-generated cues in mild Alzheimer's disease (AD), and the factors promoting effi cient cue utilization in this group of patients, were examined in two experiments on memory for words. Results from both experiments showed that normal old adults as well as AD patients performed better with se lf-generated cues than with experimenter-provided cues, although the l atter type of cues resulted in gains relative to free recall. The find ings indicate no qualitative differences in patterns of performance be tween the normal old and the AD patients. For both groups of subjects, cue effectiveness was optimized when (a) there was self-generation ac tivity at encoding, and (b) encoding and retrieval conditions were com patible.