No evidence for age-related differences in item-method directed forgetting of emotional words

Research indicates that people can intentionally forget, but it is less clear how ageing and emotion interact with this ability. The present research investigated item-method directed forgetting of negative, neutral, and positive words in young (20–35 years), young-old (60–74 years), and old-old (75–89 years) adults. Although old-old adults showed overall reduced memory compared to young and young-old adults, all three age groups showed intentional forgetting. Moreover, intentional forgetting was not affected by the valence of the word in any of the three age groups. These findings suggest that younger and older adults can intentionally forget information that is neutral or emotional in nature. The present study’s results extend previous research by showing that this ability is preserved in very old age.