Attenzione top-down per le rappresentazioni del corpo nell'invecchiamento

The content of memory can influence visuo-spatial attention. Specific memory contents may differently guide attention within the environment. In healthy young individuals, biological stimuli are more prone to guide attention during search compared to non-biological stimuli. Here we aimed at investigating the guidance effect of memory for biological stimuli and non-biological stimuli in healthy ageing. The impact of interoceptive sensitivity on memory-based attention was also considered. We tested 36 healthy older individuals with a top-down attention paradigm using chair, bodies and faces as stimuli (Memory task). As a control task, subjects were required to perform a bottom-up paradigm using the same stimuli (Priming task). The interoceptive sensitivity was investigated using a self-report questionnaire. Contrary to the results found in a younger sample, we found an advantage of biological stimuli only in the bottom-up paradigm, during which participants mainly used implicit memory for the prime stimulus. Moreover, results showed that the more sensitive to visceral signals was the participants the less they were distracted by the priming stimulus in the visual search task. This effect occurred for bodies only. We discuss these results in light of the explicit memory and bodily-motor functions changing observed in healthy ageing.