Ageing affects event-related potentials and brain oscillations: a behavioral and electrophysiological study using a haptic recognition memory task

In this electrophysiological study, we investigated the effects of ageing on recognition memory for three-dimensional (3D) familiar objects presented to touch in a continuous paradigm. To examine changes in event-related potentials (ERPs) and brain oscillations, we recorded the EEGs of healthy groups of young (n = 14; mean age = 32.3 years) and older adults (n = 14; mean age = 65.1). Both age groups exhibited similar accuracy and exploration times when making old–new judgments. Young and older participants showed a marginally significant ERP old/new effect widely distributed over the scalp between 550–750 ms. In addition, the elders showed lower amplitude than younger participants within 1200–1500 ms. There were age-related differences in brain oscillations as measured by event-related spectral perturbation (ERSP). Older adults showed greater alpha and beta power reductions than young participants, suggesting the recruitment of additional neural resources. In contrast, the two age groups showed a reliable old/new effect in the theta band that temporarily overlapped the ERP old/new effect. The present results suggest that despite similar behavioral performance, the young and older adults recruited different neural resources to perform a haptic recognition task.