Episodic and semantic musical memory in elderly people

The present study evaluates the role of salience and tonality of music on recognition memory in elderly non-musicians. A recognition memory task for unknown musical stimuli belonging to different categories [tonal/salient, tonal/non-salient, non-tonal/salient and non-tonal/non-salient] was administered to 42 subjects (mean age 75 ± 7.5). Correct and incorrect ‘remember’ (R) and ‘know’ (K) responses, respectively related to episodic and semantic memory according to Tulving’s model, and ‘no’ recognition responses (X) were analyzed. A comparison with a population of young subjects was performed too. Results show that saliency is a significant factor for correct R (episodic memory), whereas tonality is a significant factor for correct K (semantic memory). The number of times the ‘study list’ was listened to does not seem to substantially affect memory recognition. Elderly adults’ performances show similar trends as young subjects’ for correct R, K, and X. Viceversa, elderly subjects gave significantly more incorrect answers for R and X, while no difference between the two groups was found for incorrect answers related to semantic memory (X), confirming the acculturation value of tonality.