ADULT AGE-DIFFERENCES IN IMPRESSION CHANGE PROCESSES

Three experiments examined the factors influencing impression change i n young and older adults. In each study, Ss formed an impression of a fictitious target person and then read additional behavioral informati on that varied in its consistency with this initial impression. On the basis of previous work, older adults were expected to be less likely than younger adults to integrate new, inconsistent information in the schema-based memory representation, which would result in less impress ion change. No support for this prediction was found: instead, young a nd older adults varied in their weighting of different types of inform ation (e.g., negative behaviors), which subsequently affected their im pressions and memory for specific behavioral information. These result s highlight the importance of considering the impact of age difference s in implicit theories about behavior on social cognition.