Nonverbal Cues of Meta-Memory Awareness in Older Adults

Nonverbal Cues of Meta-Memory Awareness in Older Adults Mandy Visser (Mandy.Visser@tilburguniversity.edu) Marie Postma-Nilsenova (M.Nilsenova@tilburguniversity.edu) Emiel Krahmer (E.J.Krahmer@tilburguniversity.edu) Marc Swerts (M.G.J.Swerts@tilburguniversity.edu) Tilburg center for Cognition and Communication (TiCC), Tilburg University, The Netherlands Abstract This study aimed to examine nonverbal expressions of older adults performing a Feeling-of-Knowing (FOK) meta- memory task, since nonverbal cues are considered to serve as indicators of memory deficit awareness. In a production experiment, we collected a variety of recalled and unrecalled answers from older adults (mean age = 79.5) and tested their accuracy. Nonverbal behavior was annotated manually and automatically using facial expression detection software. We found an overall effect of FOK ratings on the use of FOK related nonverbal features. For recalled items, the participants used more nonverbal cues with lower FOKs than with higher FOKs. For unrecalled items, the opposite effect was found. A subsequent perceptual study showed that third-party judges were able to estimate older adults’ FOK correctly. Overall, this study shows that the elderly can be aware of their memory deficits and display the associated nonverbal cues in a manner comparable to younger age groups. Keywords: Meta-memory; Feeling-of-Knowing; nonverbal cues; older adults. Introduction Oftentimes, when asked a question, we can reliably estimate whether we know the answer or not even before actually retrieving it from our memory. This type of guess is referred to as Feeling-of-Knowing (FOK) (Hart, 1965) and is considered to be a form of meta-memory comparable to the well-known Tip-of-the-Tongue phenomenon. Various studies have shown that FOK levels correlate with both verbal and non-verbal expressiveness displayed when responding to questions (e.g., Krahmer & Swerts, 2005; Smith & Clark, 1993). These findings indicate that the presence or absence of particular non-verbal features, employed in the context of monitoring one’s memory, signal an individual’s awareness of memory deficits. Research on children and younger adults showed a link between FOK accuracy and nonverbal expressiveness (Krahmer & Swerts, 2005) but there are at least three reasons to assume that the findings cannot be extended to older population. First, in older age groups, FOK accuracy appears to decrease at least for some types of knowledge, like in episodic memory tasks (e.g., Souchay, Moulin, Clarys, Taconnat & Isingrini, 2007). The decrease in accuracy may, in turn, affect the accompanying non-verbal behavior. Second, older adults are arguably less expressive in their non-verbal behavior. Although findings on expressing positive emotions are mixed, negative emotions like fear and anger are found to be less intense in elderly, compared to young adults (Carstensen, Pasupathi, Mayr & Nesselroade, 2000; Levenson, Carstensen, Friesen & Ekman, 1991), possibly thanks to a better-developed emotion regulation mechanism (Charles & Carstensen, 2007). Third, the use of non-verbal expressions by the elderly may be affected by the higher frequency of the experienced retrieval failures and tip-of-the-tongue states (Gollan & Brown, 2006). Older adults are more prone to word retrieval failures than younger adults, for example due to their greater vocabulary knowledge (Burke, MacKay, Worthley & Wade, 1991). In the research reported here, we set out to obtain a comprehensive overview of the non-verbal cues displayed by older adults, using a variant of the FOK paradigm, as applied in earlier question-answering studies (e.g., Smith & Clark, 1993). In the original paradigm due to Hart (1965), also referred to as the recall-judgment-recognition paradigm, participants are exposed to a three-step procedure starting with a series of general knowledge questions. In response to these questions (i.e., “What is the capital of Switzerland? ”), participants are either able to recall the answers (“Bern”) or not (“I don’t know”). Subsequently, for the unrecalled items, participants are asked to judge whether or not they believed they would be able to recognize the correct answer among several wrong alternatives, e.g., when presented in a multiple-choice test. In the last part of the procedure - the recognition – they are given a multiple- choice test and asked to select the correct answers to the previously queried items. Hart (1965) referred to the participants’ judgment elicited during the second step in the procedure as their Feeling-of-Knowing. FOKs serve as assessments that information is available in memory, even when it has not been retrieved (e.g., Eakin & Hertzog, 2012; Hart, 1965; Singer & Tiede, 2008). During the course of answering questions, people undergo several alternating processes. While being questioned, people actively search in their mind for the correct answer. Simultaneously, this retrieval is monitored on a meta- cognitive level. This means that while formulating or searching for the correct answer, people are continuously evaluating whether they are capable to answer the question