Aging and the Role of Working Memory Resources in Visuospatial Attention

Visuospatial attention has been shown to be robust to the effects of increasing age. Nonetheless, models linking individual differences in working memory capacity to attentional performance suggest that older adults may experience disruptions in visuospatial attention under conditions of resource load. Two experiments were conducted to investigate the effects of age and concurrent working memory load on two tasks that have been proposed to require posterior attentional processes. The findings suggest that loading working memory resources selectively disrupts performance on a nonintegrated Stroop task, whereas cue utilization remains intact. In addition, imposing a working memory load delays the deployment of visuospatial attention in both experiments. Regarding the effects of age, findings suggest that older adults can effectively perform both attentional tasks despite working memory load. Age differences did emerge in the time course of cue utilization. Findings point to the resilience of visuospatial attention in aging, even under conditions of significant cognitive load. We discuss these results and their implications for models postulating a role for working memory capacity in attentional behaviors.