Modulation of the prospective and retrospective components of memory for intentions in younger and older adults

We evaluate two hypotheses that have implications for the study of prospect ive memory. First, we examine whether the effect of age is greater on the p rospective component or the retrospective component of memory for intention s; and second, we examine whether data-driven and conceptually driven proce sses differentially influence these two components. The influence of data-d riven processes was varied by maintaining or changing the format of the pro spective cue from study to test. The influence of conceptually driven proce sses was manipulated by varying the degree of semantic relatedness between the prospective cue and intention. The effect of age was greater on the pro spective component than on the retrospective component. A change in study-t est format had the greatest effect on the prospective component, whereas th e degree of semantic relatedness had the greatest effect on the retrospecti ve component. These findings suggest that memory for intentions is influenc ed by both data-driven and conceptually driven processes.