The research discussed in the present volume indicates that language and memory do not decline uniformly in old age but that there are some aspects of each which are impaired and some which are spared. In this chapter, we focus on different approaches to understanding the patterns of impaired and spared functioning in language and memory in old age. The search for patterns that describe categories of behavior that share properties is prominent in several approaches to the study of memory and language. In experimental psychology, there is a tradition of concern for dissociations among different aspects of cognition (see Klatzky, this volume). Within the study of memory, distinctions have been made among a variety of memory systems (e.g., Atkinson & Shiffrin, 1968; Baddeley, 1986; Tulving, 1972, 1983). More generally, cognitive processes have been categorized as effortful or automatic (Hasher & Zacks, 1979). Within the neuropsychological literature, there is an attempt to identify patterns of behaviors that are impaired in particular neuropathological conditions (Squire, 1987). In the study of individual differences, the factor-analytic approach is widely used to identify patterns of association among specific abilities (Thurstone, 1938).

In this chapter, we consider what the experimental, neuropsychological, and individual-difference approaches contribute to our understanding of language and memory in old age. Within the experimental approach, we focus on certain memory distinctions, and, in our final section, on distinctions between automatic and effortful processes.