Paul Hoffman

Learning new skills and information becomes more challenging as people get older, but learning collaboratively can provide benefits to learning in older age. Prior work has predominantly focused on improved learning in terms of accuracy and efficiency when interacting with another human compared to learning alone, while the potential benefits of a human learning with a computer are understudied. It has been reported that older adults learn more efficiently and accurately when they believe they are interacting with a human compared to a computer to perform the Barrier Task. In the current study, we examined the effect of agency on performance on the Map Task, a test that measures spatial cognition, where participants must orally collaborate to reproduce a route printed on one participant’s map onto another’s, and which is considered a more ecologically valid measure of real-life communication compared to other materials used to study collaborative learning. We used a Wizard-of-Oz paradigm, in which participants interacted with a computer system, but were told that they were interacting with either a human assistant or computer. Twenty-four older adult participants (aged 66–79 years) completed an adapted version of the Map Task with a (perceived) human partner or computer to plan and execute a route, doing so through conversation. Overall, participants engaged similarly with their human and computer partner, but recall was more accurate when the information had been provided by the human, compared to the computer. Participants’ negative perceptions about the computer-provided information may have driven this effect. These findings may influence how voice-based learning systems are introduced to older end-users, and strategies for negotiating agency between the human user and the voice-based system, to influence collaborative learning in older age. Future work should attempt to replicate these findings in a larger sample.

Semantic cognition (use of acquired world knowledge to guide behavior) is critical in everyday life. Semantic cognition is often assumed to be preserved in later life, compensating for functional declines in other cognitive domains. However, aging research rarely considers age-related effects on nonverbal knowledge or on semantic control processes that regulate how knowledge is activated and used. We addressed this by conducting the most detailed assessment of semantic cognition across the adult lifespan to date, involving 537 adults aged between 20 and 91. Verbal semantic knowledge increased linearly across adulthood while nonverbal knowledge reached a plateau at age 50. In contrast, controlled semantic processing showed age-related decline, particularly in the ability to inhibit task-irrelevant semantic knowledge. These results indicate that semantic cognition is not uniformly preserved in old age: Though older people know more than young people, they are less able to use their knowledge flexibly in novel situations. (PsycInfo Database Record (c) 2026 APA, all rights reserved).

Understanding narratives requires at least transient access to the semantic system, to decode incoming content, and prolonged access to the default mode network to maintain and manipulate the narrative model. Subregions within the integrative semantic hubs in bilateral anterior temporal lobe appear differentially sensitive to the need to rapidly decode external input (exogenous processing) versus reflecting on context stored in the narrative model (endogenous processing). The latter is most consistently reported in the middle temporal gyrus portion of the hub, suggesting that this region serves as a critical hinge point, dynamically interacting with the default mode network to facilitate endogenous processing. The present study investigated this by characterizing the functional connectivity profiles of anterior temporal lobe subregions during movie-viewing and examining content-evoked changes in these profiles. Compared to other anterior temporal lobe subregions, middle temporal gyrus was more functionally connected to the default mode network, and these connections were strengthened during moments with limited incoming information, providing viewers with a chance to reflect on the content. Rather than being functionally distinct networks, the semantic and default mode systems dynamically interact to facilitate reflection or endogenous semantic processing. Future work should further characterize how neural systems dynamically shift from integrated to segregated states in response to everyday processing demands.

Producing coherent discourse requires us to regulate the content of our speech and avoid interference from discourse-irrelevant concepts that become active in semantic memory. The inhibitory deficit hypothesis proposes that coherence declines in later life are due to a reduced ability to inhibit these irrelevant ideas. However, the existing evidence in support of this view is correlational. We performed an experimental test of the hypothesis by asking young (18-25) and older (70-90) participants to produce discourse on a range of topics while attending to two types of visual distractors: images of meaningful concepts and meaningless abstract patterns. The overall global coherence of responses was lower when participants were distracted (cf. no distraction) but this effect was not larger for meaningful distractors. Participants also spoke more slowly under distraction. These effects did not differ between age groups. Critically, however, in the meaningful distractor condition, responses diverged from the original topic more quickly than in the other conditions. This effect was only present in older participants. These results suggest two underlying effects at play. First, performing a concurrent task has a general effect on the speed and coherence of discourse, which in this study was age-invariant. Second, for older people, tasks that activate a series of irrelevant semantic representations have an additional cumulative effect on discourse content, causing it to deviate off topic more rapidly. Our results support the inhibitory deficit hypothesis and suggest that older people can improve their coherence by avoiding semantically laden environmental distractors like TV or radio programes. (PsycInfo Database Record (c) 2025 APA, all rights reserved).

Reliance on internal predictive models of the world is central to many theories of human cognition. Yet it is unknown whether humans acquire multiple separate internal models, each evolved for a specific domain, or maintain a globally unified representation. Using fMRI during naturalistic experiences (movie watching and narrative listening), we show that three topographically distinct midline prefrontal cortical regions perform distinct predictive operations. The ventromedial PFC updates contextual predictions (States), the anteromedial PFC governs reference frame shifts for social predictions (Agents), and the dorsomedial PFC predicts transitions across the abstract state spaces (Actions). Prediction-error-driven neural transitions in these regions, indicative of model updates, coincided with subjective belief changes in a domain-specific manner. We find these parallel top-down predictions are unified and selectively integrated with visual sensory streams in the Precuneus, shaping participants’ ongoing experience. Results generalized across sensory modalities and content, suggesting humans recruit abstract, modular predictive models for both vision and language. Our results highlight a key feature of human world modeling: fragmenting information into abstract domains before global integration.

Excessive self-blaming emotions are commonly observed in anxiety disorders, with qualitatively similar symptomatology reported in subclinical populations. Interpretation of moral information requires assessing the social conceptual information, a process overseen by the superior anterior temporal lobe (sATL). Feelings of self-blame evoke interactions of sATL and socio-affective regions, and previous research shows that subclinical anxiety modulates the organisation of the self-blame circuitry. This study aimed to extend these findings by exploring links of trait-anxiety with (i) self-blaming emotions and associated behaviours in an experimental task, and (ii) self-blame-dependent neural activity and connectivity, as observed during reliving of autobiographical guilt memories. We also explored the role of resting-state fMRI in linking these phenomena. Increased anxiety was linked to stronger self-blaming emotions, and more pronounced self-attacking and hiding. When experiencing negative emotions about themselves (i.e. shame and self-anger), anxious individuals were also less likely to disengage from self-focused thoughts. These behavioural findings were paralleled by enhanced self-blame-related connectivity between the left sATL and bilateral posterior subgenual cingulate cortex. Distinct patterns of activity and connectivity within the ATL-related circuitry were furthermore linked to individual differences in intensity of the self-blaming emotions and approach-avoidance motivation towards the guilt memories. As such, the results of the current study link stronger self-blaming emotions in anxious individuals with specific maladaptive patterns of behaviour. Furthermore, the work provides robust evidence for the important role of ATL-related circuitry in self-blame processing, supporting its broader involvement in social conceptual processing and its alterations in subclinical anxiety.

Conceptual knowledge—about objects, events, and social behaviour—is represented within the semantic system, but it is unclear if different conceptual categories engage the same portions of the system. This is perhaps most relevant for event-based, or thematic, knowledge and social knowledge which is acquired through social experiences. The present study investigated neural specialisation for social concepts by examining whether distinct semantic regions or hubs represent taxonomic versus thematic relations and social versus non-social relations. Specialization was examined in two groups with different social experiences: autistic and non-autistic adults. There were minimal behavioural and no neural differences between groups, suggesting that differences in social experiences between autistic and non-autistic people may be better understood at the interactional level. In whole-brain analyses across both groups, taxonomic relations engaged the semantic control network to a greater extent than thematic relations did, and n overlapping portion of the rostroventral area of left angular gyrus was engaged by both thematic (relative to taxonomic) and social (relative to non-social) relations. Region of interest analyses revealed a more complex pattern within bilateral angular gyri. The results suggest that angular gyrus represents conceptual knowledge in a graded fashion, including specialisation for thematic and social relations.

Creative thinking is a complex, higher-order ability that draws on multiple cognitive systems. However, the contribution of specific semantic control processes to creativity remains unclear. The current study had two goals: First, we investigated how individual differences in semantic knowledge and control contribute to divergent and convergent styles of creative thinking, beyond the involvement of domain-general executive functions. Second, we explored whether there were age-related differences in semantic and executive abilities, and if these differences influenced the ability to think creatively. Specifically, we examined the role of the two components of semantic control: controlled retrieval and semantic selection. In our study, 63 younger adults and 64 older adults completed semantic, executive, and creative thinking measures. Younger adults demonstrated better executive functioning, while older adults exhibited superior semantic knowledge, controlled retrieval, and convergent thinking abilities. Crucially, there were no age differences across several divergent thinking metrics: automated originality scoring, human ratings, or uniqueness. Regression analyses indicated that semantic knowledge and updating executive ability influenced convergent thinking abilities across both age groups. In contrast, semantic control abilities were predictive of divergent thinking skills, but only in the younger group. Our results emphasize the key role of the semantic system in creative thought, and, critically, indicate that divergent and convergent thinking may rely on different aspects of semantic cognition. Moreover, the recruitment of these abilities varies across the lifespan, in line with increased knowledge reserves and declines in executive control seen in older adults.