Discovery
Variety is the Spice of Learning and Memory
Older adults learned a memory task best after practicing multiple related tasks, suggesting that diverse cognitive training supports mental sharpness as we age.
People often think that the best way to get better at something is to simply practice it over and over again, but robust skill learning is actually supported by variation in practice,” said lead investigator Elizabeth A. L. Stine-Morrow, a Beckman researcher and professor emerita of Educational Psychology in the College of Education at Illinois.