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Growing old gracefully may very well be a fact of life. Research into developmental changes in attention and memory support a correlation between increasing age and better emotional well-being. An article in the September issue of Psychological Science, a journal of the American Psychological Society, suggests that older adults remember more and focus their attention more on positive information.

These findings are consistent with the increased emotional well-being people seem to acquire with age.

When reading a newspaper, for example, older adults more likely to attend to and remember positive events and stories. In other words, they may attend to and remember events that increase their emotional satisfaction and meaning.

The authors argue that "it is older adults' increased emphasis on emotional goals that directs their attention away from information that is not emotionally gratifying." The authors, Mara Mather of University California, Santa Cruz, and Laura L. Carstensen, Stanford University, found that "older adults are more likely to remember events that will increase their current emotional well-being." The research also shows young adults do not show a systematic bias in regard to what they remember. Only older adults possess an emotionally gratifying bias related to attention and memory.

For more information contact Mather at mather@ucsc.edu or www-psych.stanford.edu/~lifespan or visit the APS Media Center at www.psychologicalscience.org/media for a complete copy of this article.

Psychological Science is ranked among the top 10 general psychology journals, for impact on the field, by the Institute of Scientific Information. The American Psychological Society represents psychologists advocating science-based psychological research in the public's interest.