Active versus passive procedural learning in older and younger adults

Twenty-four older and 24 younger adults were compared on procedural learning tasks (i.e. Tower of Hanoi puzzle). Half of the participants in each group went through active training (i.e. standard administration), and the other half through passive training (i.e. followed instructions read to them). The effect of the different types of training was tested immediately and one week after training. In addition the different groups were tested on a more difficult version of the task. The results demonstrate that active training leads to better performance than passive training on the more difficult task. The magnitude of this advantage was consistent for both age groups. Furthermore, active training seems to leave more durable traces in memory than passive training. The effect of elaboration in procedural versus declarative memory is discussed with relation to the effect of age.