# Influence of Culture on Learning and Decision Making with Age

> **NIH NIH R01** · BRANDEIS UNIVERSITY · 2022 · $495,224

## Abstract

The effects of aging are largely assumed to be universal across different cultures. Few studies test this assumption
of universality, with some revealing cross-cultural differences in cognition with age. The proposed research will
assess how culture (American/Taiwan) and cultural values (collectivism/independence) affect cognitive aging by
comparing younger and older adults across cultures using behavioral and neuroimaging (fMRI) measures. The
research program will employ longitudinal measures, assessing behavior and brain changes in the same individuals
after a 3 year follow-up. Longitudinal approaches are important to establish that differences between extreme age
groups (e.g., 20 vs. 70 year olds) reflect effects of aging rather than other potential cohort differences. Even
longitudinal follow-up periods as short as a few years are sufficient to identify declines in performance or the volume
of some brain regions, though less work has investigated effects of aging on functional brain activity longitudinally.
Moreover, longitudinal measures may have sensitivity to identify exaggerated declines in aging, which could indicate
pathological processes associated with aging, such as mild cognitive impairment (MCI) or Alzheimer’s disease (AD).
That is, older adults who show poorer levels of performance on neuropsychological, decision making, or memory
tasks at time 1 may show more pronounced decline at time 2, compared to those older adults performing at higher
levels. Pronounced decline over time may serve as a marker of pathological aging (e.g., MCI or AD). The tasks
selected for this research have shown promise in detecting dysfunctional patterns of aging; we will further test
whether the markers are equally sensitive across cultures. Although both decision making and memory abilities can
be affected by aging, the selected tasks engage largely complementary systems, with value-based decision making
relying on frontostriatal systems and memory processes engaging medial temporal regions. One framework
suggests that these systems differ in their vulnerability to pathological aging processes (e.g., AD) such that the
frontostriatal systems largely reflect typical aging processes whereas AD disproportionately impacts temporo-
parietal regions. We can test this model in the proposed research by studying decision making and memory
processes across younger and older adults longitudinally, extending the model across cultures. The proposed
research will address three major questions: 1) how do culture and cultural values contribute to value-based
decision-making with age, 2) does aging consistently impact explicit memory across cultures, and 3) to what
extent do cultural differences in decision making and memory generalize from cross-sectional to longitudinal
(within-participant) measures of aging. This research will be led by two researchers with a history of collaboration
who have established lines of aging research in the US (Gutchess) and Taiwan (Goh). Fu...

## Key facts

- **NIH application ID:** 10341096
- **Project number:** 5R01AG061886-04
- **Recipient organization:** BRANDEIS UNIVERSITY
- **Principal Investigator:** ANGELA GUTCHESS
- **Activity code:** R01 (R01, R21, SBIR, etc.)
- **Funding institute:** NIH
- **Fiscal year:** 2022
- **Award amount:** $495,224
- **Award type:** 5
- **Project period:** 2019-03-01 → 2023-12-31

## Primary source

NIH RePORTER: https://reporter.nih.gov/project-details/10341096

## Citation

> US National Institutes of Health, RePORTER application 10341096, Influence of Culture on Learning and Decision Making with Age (5R01AG061886-04). Retrieved via AI Analytics 2026-05-24 from https://api.ai-analytics.org/grant/nih/10341096. Licensed CC0.

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