Dual Task Effects on Visual Attention Capacity in Normal Aging

Künstler, Erika C. S.; Penning, Melanie D.; Napiórkowski, Natan; Klingner, Carsten M.; Witte, Otto W.; Müller, Hermann J.; Bublak, Peter; Finke, Kathrin; Finke, Kathrin · 2018 · DOAJ

DOI: 10.3389/fpsyg.2018.01564

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Summary

This study investigates the specific mechanisms underlying dual-task performance decrements in normal aging, addressing whether older adults exhibit qualitatively different attentional deficits or merely experience the same effects as younger adults under higher cognitive load. While previous research established that older adults struggle more with concurrent motor and cognitive tasks, the precise attentional components affected remained unclear. The authors utilized the Theory of Visual Attention (TVA) to mathematically model distinct parameters of visual processing: perceptual threshold ($t_0$), processing speed ($C$), and visual short-term memory (VSTM) storage capacity ($K$). The central hypothesis was that age-related dual-task interference is driven by a specific decline in VSTM capacity, which serves as a central attentional resource shared between visual uptake and motor execution. The experimental design involved 90 participants divided into three groups of 30: older adults (50–78 years), younger adults performing a simple tapping task, and younger adults performing a complex tapping task. All participants engaged in a TVA-based whole-report task, where they verbally reported briefly presented letter arrays, while simultaneously performing a continuous finger-tapping secondary task. The simple tapping sequence involved two fingers, whereas the complex sequence required four fingers, designed to increase motor demand for younger participants to match the relative difficulty experienced by older adults. Performance was measured under both single-task and dual-task conditions. The TVA model was fitted to the whole-report data to derive individual estimates for $t_0$, $C$, and $K$, allowing for a precise quantification of which attentional parameters were compromised by the concurrent motor load. The results indicated that VSTM storage capacity ($K$) was the primary parameter affected by dual-tasking. Older adults showed a significant decline in $K$ when performing the simple tapping task concurrently with the visual task. In contrast, younger adults performing the simple tapping task showed no significant reduction in $K$. However, younger adults performing the more complex tapping task did exhibit a significant reduction in VSTM capacity, mirroring the decline seen in the older group. No significant effects were found on the other TVA parameters ($t_0$ and $C$) or on tapping accuracy across groups. Furthermore, goodness-of-fit measures were comparable between single- and dual-task conditions, suggesting that participants processed tasks in a qualitatively similar, continuous manner, albeit with reduced quantitative efficiency under dual-task demands. These findings support a capacity-sharing account of motor-cognitive dual-tasking, identifying VSTM storage capacity as a central attentional resource shared across visual and motor domains. The study concludes that older adults do not exhibit qualitatively different attentional effects but rather reach capacity limits earlier and under lower motor complexity than younger adults. This implies that the heightened risk of falls and dual-task interference in aging is linked to a reduced central attentional capacity that is more easily saturated by concurrent demands, rather than a fundamental change in how attention is allocated.

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Topics

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• dual task multitasking
• dual task performance