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AGE AND BEHAVIOR: PROBLEM SOLVING – INFLEXIBILITY - ANOTHER VIEW - MODIFICATION STUDIES BY LABOUVIE-VIEF AND GONDA

One of the  studies was Labouvie-Vief and Gonda (1976). The specifics of the task were different from those above, but shared with them the need of finding the rule or concept necessary for correct solution of the problem. This study, like the other two, consisted of training and then testing, but it had two added features: One, there was a period of delayed testing (10-28 days later) to see whether the training was longer-lasting than just during the period of initial examination. Two, the study also tested with a task different from that of training, but related to it. This was for the purpose of seeing whether the training effects could be generalized to other tasks.
Women aged 63-95 years were divided into four groups and each provided with different experiences. One group had no training, another was given opportunity to work with the problems but nothing else. This group was seen as having "unspecific training." Another group was taught how to plan and guide themselves in solving the problems, and a last group was taught this also but, in addition, they were taught how to overcome anxiety and cope with failure.
The results were partly expected, partly not. They showed that the special training, both with and without the anxiety reduction, made for better test performances than no training. But for delayed testing—tests made about two weeks afterward—and for tests with different problems to see how generalizable the training procedures were, the results were mixed. Sometimes one training procedure was seen as better, sometimes another. The biggest surprise was that unspecific training, while not seen as helpful in immediate testing, was the only procedure seen as helpful in both delayed and generalized testing. Labouvie-Vief and Gonda (1976) concluded that "The finding of any training effects offers an argument against the traditional implication . . . that intellectual aging decrements are irreversible." Further, they indicated that "there may be a good deal more plasticity to the intelligence in old age than has been acknowledged thus far."
No issue ought to be taken with these conclusions—only encouragement. This study, however, and the other "modification studies," those discussed above, suggest that if problem-solving performances can be improved by training or practice, then the origin of the initial difficulty must be experiential, rather than biological. This is incorrect—these studies show reversibility, or more correctly, they show improvement, but they do not show what the origin of difficulty is. It could be experiential, biological, or both.
These modification studies may well be forerunners of others to come; they show the way to future studies, which may be most useful.
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