AUTOMATIC CATEGORY SEARCH AND ITS TRANSFER - AGING, TYPE OF SEARCH, AND LEVEL OF LEARNING

We examined the site of learning as a function of task type and age. T wo experiments examined whether learning in semantic category search i s exclusive to trained elements of categories or generalizable to othe r elements of the trained categories. Specifically, we examined how pr actice searching for small subsets of exemplars from taxonomic categor ies transferred to untrained elements of those categories. Young and o ld adults received extensive practice on memory search (Experiment 1) or visual search (Experiment 2) tasks. Participants then transferred t o conditions assessing whether learning was exclusive to the trained w ords or generalizable to other elements of the trained categories. The site of learning in memory search appears to be at the category level for both young and old adults. Level of learning in visual search app ears to differ as a function of age. Young adults' learning generalize s to the category level, whereas older adults' learning is specific to the trained words.