Individual Differences in Subjective Organization and Verbal Learning in Old Age

Background/Study Context: Previous research has shown an increase of subjective organization of stimuli and of recall performance across learning trials. However, up to date, it has not been examined whether subjective organization and recall performance are positively related also at the level of the individual. To close this gap, parameters of verbal learning were regressed on growth parameters of subjective organization. Methods: The sample for this investigation involved N = 205 subjects (65 to 80 years old). Participants learned a word list containing 27 unrelated words, presented randomly across five trials. Subjective organization was measured by using the Paired Frequency measure. Results: Overall, there were reliable individual differences with regard to both subjective organization and verbal learning. Results showed that the learning parameters were positively correlated with the initial level and linear slope of subjective organization. Furthermore, growth parameters of subjective organization turned out to be reliable predictors of verbal learning. Conclusion: The present study emphasized the role of analyzing individual differences in subjective organization. Implications are discussed, in particular, regarding the interdependency of subjective organization and verbal learning in old age.