Maintenance of Gains Following Multifactorial and Unifactorial Memory Training in Late Adulthood

This study compared the effects of a multifactorial memory training program (encoding operations, attentional functions, and relaxation) with those of a unifactorial program (encoding operations) on memory performance in older adults. A control group received no training. Results showed that the multifactorial group improved performance following training in free recall of concrete words and maintained that improvement six months after completion of training. The unifactorial group showed less improvement following training on free recall of concrete words and also maintained the improvement six months later. All three groups improved slightly in recall of abstract words across time. Finally, none of the groups showed any improvement in digit span and the Benton visual retention test. These patterns of data indicate that multifactorial training may result in larger gains immediately after training compared with unifactorial training but that both programs lead to maintenance of improvement. Furthermore, the results suggest that the effects of memory training may be fairly task‐specific in nature.