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The Effect of Age on Decision Making According to the Iowa Gambling Task

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  10 January 2013

Janaína Castro Núñez Carvalho ,
Caroline de Oliveira Cardoso ,
Daniela Shneider-Bakos ,
Christian Haag Kristensen  and
Rochele Paz Fonseca
Janaína Castro Núñez Carvalho
Affiliation:
Pontifícia Universidade Católica do Rio Grande do Sul (Brazil)
Caroline de Oliveira Cardoso*
Affiliation:
Pontifícia Universidade Católica do Rio Grande do Sul (Brazil)
Daniela Shneider-Bakos
Affiliation:
Universidade Luterana do Brazil (Brazil)
Christian Haag Kristensen
Affiliation:
Pontifícia Universidade Católica do Rio Grande do Sul (Brazil)
Rochele Paz Fonseca
Affiliation:
Pontifícia Universidade Católica do Rio Grande do Sul (Brazil)
*
Correspondence concerning this article should be addressed to Janaína Castro Núñez Carvalho. Carvalho Av. Cel. Gastao Haslocher Mazeron, 129, apartamento 403, Porto Alegre, RS (Brazil). CEP 90280370. Phone + 55-51-32398103. E-mail: janainanunez@gmail.com
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Abstract

Aging has been associated with several brain changes that often affect the cognitive functioning of adults, but changes in executive functions, particularly in the field of decision making, have not been fully investigated. The Iowa Gambling Task (IGT) is a widely used tool to evaluate decision making, but little is known about the effect of age on its results. This study used the IGT and compared healthy young (n= 40) and elderly (n = 40) adults to evaluate their decision making processes. There were significant differences in the learning curve of the two age groups, but no difference in overall IGT performance. The results for the first IGT block were different from those of the rest of the task, and the group of elderly adults had a better performance in this block. Elderly adults also showed a preference for deck A, the one that resulted in greater losses. Findings confirmed the results of other studies, which reported that the IGT block score is the variable with the greatest sensitivity to age in this instrument.

El envejecimiento se ha asociado con diversos cambios en el cerebro que a menudo afectan al funcionamiento cognitivo de los adultos, pero los cambios en las funciones ejecutivas, en particular en el ámbito de la toma de decisiones, no han sido investigados a fondo. La Iowa Gambling Task (IGT) es una herramienta ampliamente utilizada para evaluar la toma de decisiones, pero se sabe poco sobre el efecto que tiene la edad en sus resultados. Este estudio utilizó la IGT y comparó adultos jóvenes (n = 40) y adultos mayores (n = 40) sanos para evaluar sus procesos de toma decisiones. Se encontraron diferencias significativas en la curva de aprendizaje de los dos grupos de edad, pero ninguna diferencia en el rendimiento general de la IGT. Los resultados del primer bloque de la IGT fueron diferentes de los resultados de los bloques restantes, y el grupo de adultos mayores tuvo un mejor rendimiento en este primer bloque. Los adultos mayores también mostraron preferencia por la sección A, la que dio como resultado valores inferiores. Los hallazgos confirman los resultados de otros estudios, los cuales informaron que la puntuación del primer bloque de la IGT es la variable con mayor sensibilidad a la edad de este instrumento.

Keywords

decision makingIowa Gambling Taskagingexecutive functionstoma de decisionesIowa Gambling Taskenvejecimientofunciones ejecutivas
Type
Research Article
Information
The Spanish Journal of Psychology , Volume 15 , Issue 2 , July 2012 , pp. 480 - 486
Copyright
Copyright © Cambridge University Press 2012

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