Decision-making and feedback sensitivity: A comparison between older and younger adults

This study investigated decision-making and feedback sensitivity in healthy older adults with a new task: the Pictures Decision Task. The study was conducted on 27 older (aged 64–88) and 26 younger adults (aged 25–57) matched for years of education. Results showed that older adults did not show the Jumping to Conclusions bias and that older adults had difficulty learning from feedback only when the context was ambiguous and not when they were given aids or interpretative information that decreased ambiguity. The Pictures Decision Task, with respect to the Iowa Gambling Task and the Wisconsin Card Sorting Test, allowed us to assess decision-making and feedback sensitivity under highly ambiguous conditions and therefore to add new insight into the reasoning process of older people.