Sensitivity of spatial integration to perceptual cues is preserved in healthy aging

Spatial integration has been shown to substantially decline with age. We examined the mechanism underlying this age-related impairment. Young and older adults were tested on the ability to integrate contour elements across variations in the collinearity of the target elements, their spatial proximity, and the relative spacing of the target elements to the background noise elements (Δ). The results show that although contour integration generally declines with age, tolerating less noise (higher Δ) than in young adulthood, its mechanism is preserved over the years, critically depending on the relations between collinearity and spatial proximity of the contour elements. The results suggest that while spatial integration in childhood is limited by the absolute contour spacing, lacking the ability to use collinearity in order to overcome poor proximity among the elements, no changes occur in the sensitivity of contour integration to these perceptual cues at the other end of the lifespan. This suggests that the sensitivity of spatial integration to the statistics of natural scenes is preserved in aging.

► We examined the mechanism underlying impaired spatial integration in healthy aging.
► We varied proximity, collinearity, and contour-to-background spacing ratio (Δ).
► Spatial integration in aging tolerates less noise (Δ) than in young adulthood.
► Sensitivity of integration to perceptual cues is preserved in aging.