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.In a total of four experiments, we tested our strategy hypothesis in arithmetic problem solving where effects of age-based stereotype threat have never been previously investigated. In two types of arithmetic tasks (problem verification, e.g., 19 x 7 = 131 True or False? in Expt. 1 and computational estimation, e.g., 32 x 67 in Expts. 2, 3, & 4), we found that threat led older adults to obtain poorer performance, to adopt less systematically and less often the better strategy on each arithmetic problem, to repeat the same strategy across trials even when it was inappropriate, and to execute available strategies more poorly. We also found that poorer strategy use mediated threat effects, individual differences in processing resources moderated individuals’ sensitivity to effects of stereotype threat and, threat effects though extant in Asian culture, are relatively more pronounced in older adults from Western culture. The overall findings in this thesis revealed that strategic variations are key mechanisms for effects of age-based stereotype threat to occur even in domains where age-related decrease in performance are smaller (like arithmetic). It also documents how domain-general and domain-specific processing resources moderate individual differences in age-based stereotype threat effects, and cultural differences in the occurrence of age-based stereotype threat effects. These findings have important implications to further understand age-based (and other) stereotype threat effects, and how a strategy perspective like the one adopted here provides important insights on how non-cognitive factors (like stereotype threat) modulate age-related changes in human cognition

When Older Adults Outperform Young Adults: Effects of Prior-Task Success in Arithmetic

International audienceBackground: Older adults improve their cognitive performance on a target task after succeeding in a prior task. We tested whether effects of prior-task success occur via changing older adults’ ability to select the better strategy and/or to execute strategies efficiently. Methods: Young and older participants (n = 162) accomplished a computational estimation task (i.e., providing the best estimates to arithmetic problems) after accomplishing a dot comparison task. Results: Both groups increased their performance on computational estimation following success on dot comparison. Older adults improved most and outperformed young adults following prior-task success. Prior-task success led older adults to select the better strategy more often and to repeat (or not) the same strategy more often when it was appropriate. Better strategy use mediated effects of prior-task success. Individual differences in baseline performance moderated individuals’ sensitivity to effects of prior-task success. Conclusion: Our findings further our understanding of mechanisms underlying effects of prior-task success and provide new perspectives on how social environment modulates age-related differences in cognitive performance

Cultural Differences in Susceptibility to Stereotype Threat: France versus India

International audienceAbstract Objectives Negative aging stereotypes make older adults perform below their true potential in a number of cognitive domains. This phenomenon, known as Age-Based Stereotype Threat, is currently viewed as a powerful factor contributing to an overestimation of cognitive decline in normal aging. However, age-based stereotype threat has been investigated almost exclusively in Western countries. Whether this phenomenon is universal or culture-specific is unknown. Method Here, we first ran a pilot study (N = 106) in which we assessed French and Indian participants’ attitudes towards aging. Then, we assessed stereotype threat effects on arithmetic problem-solving performance and strategies in French and Indian older adults (N = 104). Results We found that French older adults have more negative implicit attitudes towards aging than Indian older adults. We also found that culture modulates age-based stereotype threat effects. Whereas French older adults experienced stereotype threat on both selection and execution of strategies on all arithmetic problems, Indian older adults experienced this threat only in their strategy selection on harder problems. Most interestingly, cultural differences emerged on arithmetic problems under stereotype threat condition, where otherwise no cultural differences were found in the control condition. Discussion Our findings have important implications for understanding how cultural contexts change aging effects on human cognition and age-related difference in cognitive performance

When and how stereotype threat influences older adults arithmetic performance? Insight from a strategy approach

International audienceIn three experiments, we investigated how age-related differences in cognitive performance are exacerbated by age-based stereotype threat. We adopted a strategy approach and investigated a domain, namely arithmetic, where age-related differences in participants' performance are either non-existent or very small and where effects of age-based stereotype threat have never been investigated. In two types of tasks (problem verification in Expt. 1 and computational estimation in Expts. 2 & 3), we found that age-based stereotype threat led older adults to obtain poorer performance, to adopt less systematically and less often the better strategy on each problem, to repeat the same strategy across trials even when it was inappropriate, and to execute available strategies more poorly. We also found that poorer strategy use mediated threat effects and that individual differences in processing resources moderated individuals' sensitivity to effects of stereotype threat. Our results establish that agebased stereotype threat effects are independent of the cognitive domain or tasks in which they are studied and of pre-experimental differences in young and older adults' performance. They deepen our knowledge of the mechanisms underlying age-based, and other, stereotype threat effects. They also document how domain-general and domain-specific processing resources moderate individual differences in age-based stereotype threat effects. Our findings have important implications to improve our understanding of how and when age-based (and other) stereotype threat effects occur, and, more generally, how psychosocial factors modulate agerelated changes in human cognition