Divided attention, aging, and priming in exemplar generation and category verification

Transfer-appropriate processing theories differentiate between conceptual- and perceptual-priming tasks. The former are said to be influenced by the n ature of processing engaged in at study, but not by changes in modality bet ween study and test; the latter are sensitive to changes in format between study and test, but not to variations in the extent of semantic processing at study. In the present experiments, we examined the effects of divided at tention and aging on priming in exemplar generation and category verificati on, two tasks that require access to semantic information at test. Manipula tions of attention during encoding affected the extent of priming in exempl ar generation, but not in category verification. Priming effects were simil ar in young and older adults in exemplar generation following study in both full and divided attention. Although older adults did not demonstrate prim ing in category verification in one experiment, no effects of age or divide d attention were observed in a second experiment. In addition, priming in c ategory verification was unaffected by varying the level of processing at e ncoding. However, the absence of levels-of-processing and attention effects in category verification does not signal that priming in this task has a p erceptual basis; priming in category Verification was insensitive to modali ty shifts between study and test. The implications of these findings for th eories of priming and cognitive aging are considered.