Self-assessment of everyday spatial memory and performance on memory tasks in old age

Metacognitive assessment tests people's ability to monitor and predict their performance and recent findings highlighted its importance in memory rehabilitation programs for older people. In this study, young and older participants were presented with a self-assessment questionnaire on everyday spatial memory and with eight tasks evaluating various aspects of memory abilities. Results indicated an effect of age, favouring young adults, in the memory tasks only: Young and older participants self-rated similarly their everyday spatial memory; moreover, self-assessment scores and memory performance did not correlate. Differences in performance between young and older participants in cognitive tasks are in line with previous findings. Nevertheless, the everyday memory questionnaire does not seem to capture the nature of these differences. This result confirms that older people lack the metacognitive ability for giving a realistic evaluation of their memory abilities.