Odor memory and aging

Although, odor memory is considered to be impervious to time, an unfortunate reality is that many older people lose some olfactorial abilities across the adult life span. This review examines the unique features of odor memory and detection in perspective of the aging adult. Memory for odors does not inherently diminish with age, but neither is it impervious to the effects of time. Many, if not most of the declines typically associated with age are the result of insult and injury, neuropathologies, pharmacological and nutritional imbalance, cognitive slowing, and diminished memorial capacity. Extent research has typically ignored major facets of efficient memory encoding and recall, especially context and experience. Among the most salient experimental factors in need of more research are lexicality effects, in which some stimuli are more easily remembered because of the ability to label or name them, either overtly or covertly. Another important experimental factor is context, typically relied on more by older persons to aid in both encoding and recall. Specific suggestions for research are discussed.