ABSTRACT

Although aging is broadly characterized by decline, the potential for new learning and plasticity persists well into the later decades of life. Scientific advances are yielding a deeper understanding of the limitations that biological aging imposes on cognitive function, as well as new insights into how the human mind and brain respond adaptively to the aging process. Neurocognitive investigations of the reciprocity between mind and brain reveal new avenues to influence and shape neural processes that underlie mental fitness, especially in the golden years. We explore these ideas to illustrate the co-constructivist framework in operation across neural, cognitive, behavioral, and cultural dimensions as they influence late-life development.

OVERVIEW

The persistence of behavioral adaptation and plasticity (i.e., modifiability) in later life has been recognized by the field of cognitive aging for several decades (e.g., Baltes, 1997). Training procedures of various sorts have been shown to enhance cognitive performance and produce long-term gains, even for older adults well into their seventies (e.g., Willis & Nesselroade, 1990). With the recent advances in genetics, in the basic neurosciences, and in brain imaging technologies, the scope and potential of age-related reorganizational processes have attained a new level of analysis and persuasion, especially for researchers whose theoretical orientation is closely linked to brain correlates of plasticity (Park, Polk, Mikels, Taylor, & Marshuetz, 2001; Reuter-Lorenz, 2002).