Cognitive Neuroscience of Aging

Until very recently, our knowledge about the neural basis of cognitive aging was based on two disciplines that had very little contact with each other. Whereas the neuroscience of aging investigated the effects of aging on the brain independently of age-related changes in cognition, the cognitive psychology of aging investigated the effects of aging on cognition independently of age-related changes in the brain. The lack of communication between these two disciplines is currently being addressed by an increasing number of studies that focus on the relationships between cognitive aging and cerebral aging. This rapidly growing body of research has come to constitute a new discipline, which may be called cognitive neuroscience of aging. The goal of Cognitive Neuroscience of Aging is to introduce the reader to this new discipline at a level that is useful to both professionals and students in the domains of cognitive neuroscience, cognitive psychology, neuroscience, neuropsychology, neurology, and other, related areas. This book is divided into four main sections. The first section describes noninvasive measures of cerebral aging, including structural (e.g., volumetric MRI), chemical (e.g., dopamine PET), electrophysiological (e.g., ERPs), and hemodynamic (e.g., fMRI), and discusses how they can be linked to behavioral measures of cognitive aging. The second section reviews evidence for the effects of aging on neural activity during different cognitive functions, including perception and attention, imagery, working memory, long-term memory, and prospective memory. The third section focuses on clinical and applied topics, such as the distinction between healthy aging and Alzheimers disease and the use of cognitive training to ameliorate age-related cognitive decline. The last section describes theories that relate cognitive and cerebral aging, including models accounting for functional neuroimaging evidence and models supported by computer simulations. Taken together, the chapters in this volume provide the first unified and comprehensive overview of the new discipline of cognitive neuroscience of aging. Roberto Cabeza , Professor in Psychological and Neuroscience, Duke University, Edited by Lars Nyberg , Professor of Neuropsychology, Umeå University, and Edited by Denise Park , Professor of Psychology, University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign CONTENTS 1: Cognitive Neuroscience of Aging: Emergence of a New Discipline (Roberto Cabeza, Lars Nyberg, and Denise C. Park) I. Imaging Measures 2: The Aging Brain Observed in Vivo: Differential Changes and Their Modifiers (Naftali Raz) 3: The Role of Dopamine Systems in Cognitive Aging (Lars Backman and Lars Farde) 4: Electrophysiological and Optical Measures of Cognitive Aging (Monica Fabiani and Gabriele Gratton) 5: BOLD Functions MRI and Cognitive Aging (Adam H. Gazzaley and Mark D'Esposito) 6: The Relationship Between Brain Activity, Cognitive Performance, and Aging: The Case of Memory (Michael D. Rugg and Alexa M. Morcom) II. Basic Cognitive Processes 7: Age-Related Changes in Neural Activity During Visual Perception and Attention (David J. Madden, Wythe L. Whiting, and Scott A. Huettel) 8: The Cognitive Neuroscience of Working Memory and Aging (Patricia A. Reuter-Lorenz and Ching-Yune C. Sylvester) 9: Long Term Memory and Aging: A Cognitive Neuroscience Perspective (Denise C. Park and Angela H. Gutchess) 10: The Neural Basis of age-Related Declines in Prospective Memory (Robert West) III. Clinical and Applied Issues 11: Three Principals for Cognitive Aging Research: Multiple Causes and Sequelae, Variance in Expression and Response, and the need for Integrative Theory (Randy L. Buckner) 12: Functional Connectivity During Memory Tasks in Healthy Aging and Dementia (Cheryl L. Grady) 13: Cognitive Training in Healthy Aging: A Cognitive Neuroscience Perspective (Lars Nyberg) IV. Models in Cognitive Neuroscience of Aging 14: Age Related Changes in Hemispheric Organization (Sander Daselaar and Roberto Cabeza) 15: Neurocomputational Perspectives Linking Neuromodulation, Processing Noise, Representational Distinctiveness, and Cognitive Aging (Shu-Chen Li)