People change in different ways as they age, both psychologically and biologically. These changes may impact them negatively and positively. Age-related cognitive function changes vary considerably across persons and at various levels, with cognitive functions becoming more visible and predisposed to some people than others to the effects of ageing.
The cognitive changes which are normative in ageing adulthood include: – Abnormal Loss of cognitive functioning such as dementia. It is a prolonged and gradual decrease in the ability to bring to mind and recall things, which in turn affect a person’s daily operation as they grow older.
The Working Memory; Older people, experience issues of memory loss (Berk, 2007). As people age, the mind loses some of its cognitive ability, and this makes it impossible to remember details of events and the ability to focus on many things at the same time. To curb challenges related to memory loss, they tend to keep their details into writing, they also avoid multitasking and instead focus on one particular activity.
Challenges in problem-solving- as people age, they face a problem in solving life challenges and instead seek the second opinion due to the slowed information processing. However, with assistance from family members and friends, they can sort out daily issues. Nevertheless, they are quick to decide on sensitive matters such as health issues as compared to the young adults who are mostly indecisive in such (Strough et al., 2003; Meegan & Berg, 2002).
The Sensory Register; Aging persons have eyesight problems as well as audiovisual processing where they retain information in the memory for a short period. These can create small decrements in their sensitivity to the senses. Loss of hearing leads to the isolation of the elderly, thus limiting their social interactions and conversations with others.
Lowed attention:-divided attention is also related to significant age-related deterioration in performing difficulty duties. Older adults show substantial impairments in tasks that require attention, such as observing visual symbols while paying attention to an auditory signal which requires switching focus between many processes.
Decision-Making process; most aged people have limitations on the ability to make decisions, particularly in real-life contexts. They depend more on prior understanding about a problem and to a smaller extent on new information; this may lead to poor decision-making which leads to wrong choices, this then calls or guidance to avoid repeating of the same mistakes in future.
References
Schaie, K. Warner (1996). “Intellectual development in adulthood.“Handbook of the
psychology of ageing 4 266-286.
Flavell, John H (1970). “Cognitive changes in adulthood.“Life-span developmental
psychology. Academic Press, 247-253.