Research

Professional ​History

I’ve been a Professor of Cognitive Psychology at the University of North Carolina at Greensboro since 2007. Prior to UNCG, I was on the faculty at Appalachian State University, and I was a post-doctoral research fellow at Georgia Tech. I received my BA in Psychology from Maryville College and my MA and PhD in Cognitive Psychology from Syracuse University.

Research Areas

Adult age differences in skill acquisition

My early work pursued how the trajectories of skill acquisition change as we age, from the perspective of extending basic models of learning to the older adult population. Skill acquisition often involves a shift from responding via a slow and effortful algorithm toward responding via a more fluent and efficient memory retrieval strategy. For example, learning to read first involves sounding words out phonetically until they are memorized and known from sight. In the laboratory, we approximate such learning using novel tasks. I am interested in how changes in strategy involve a combination of learning incidentally while performing the task as well as learning in a more purposeful and goal-directed manner. In addition to understanding each route to learning and the respective roles of each route during skill acquisition, I am interested in the contribution of each to age differences in skilled performance. For example, older adults learn more slowly and perform tasks more slowly at their maximum speed (Touron, Hoyer, & Cerella, 2001). There also seems to be age-related decline specific to strategy shift (Touron, Hoyer, & Cerella, 2004). I have examined strategy shifts at the level of individual stimulus items (Touron, 2006) and found age differences suggesting that older adults’ greater conservatism in strategy selection leads to more gradual strategy shift for individual items as well as to more collective strategy shifts (Touron & Hertzog, 2004 a).

Memory avoidance in older adults

Given these outcomes, I began to study how volition and choice can influence older adults’ shift toward retrieval strategies (Touron & Hertzog, 2004 b). Older adults’ slower shift is impacted by an aversion to use a retrieval strategy, even for well-learned information. Determinants of age differences in strategic behavior appear to include cognitive abilities as well as beliefs about cognition, performance monitoring, and the mental task model (Hertzog, Touron, & Hines, 2007; Hertzog & Touron, 2011). Further cementing a volitional influence, modest incentives can eliminate older adults’ maladaptive strategy use, substantially reducing observed age differences in performance (Touron, Swaim, & Hertzog, 2007). Importantly, a failure to recognize age differences in strategy choice can lead to the exaggeration of age-related declines in learning.

​​Strategic approach to complex and everyday tasks

The above work examined skill acquisition in novel laboratory tasks. In related work, I have examined adult age differences in strategy use and cognitive performance within more complex and everyday task domains. For example, Rawson & Touron (2009, 2015) examined memory strategy use in a reading comprehension, and found very small age differences in skill development. Although older adults’ slower shift again appeared to be due to age differences in bias against using retrieval rather than associative learning differences, the finding that older adults’ shift to retrieval is more rapid in reading tasks indicates that older adults might learn more readily or adopt new strategies more willingly when performing tasks that include a rich contextual representation or substantial previous experience. In an ongoing project, I have examined older adults’ strategy use everyday life tasks and situations using a daily diary survey approach (Frank, Jordano, Browne, & Touron, 2016). As expected, older adults tend to perform tasks that they had more experience with, and so used memory more often compared to young adults. Older adults’ strategy choices are more likely to be influenced by metacognitive factors such as memory confidence and speed/accuracy preference, findings that are consistent with our laboratory research. I have also investigated the contributions of metacognitive and strategic factors to adult age differences in complex tasks such as working memory (Touron, Oransky, Meier, & Hines, 2009), source memory (Kuhlmann & Touron, 2011, 2012, in press), prospective memory (Rummel, Kuhlmann, & Touron, 2013), and task mental models (Frank & Touron, in press).

Influences of performance monitoring on study strategies across adulthood

Another focus of my work has been the investigation of how performance monitoring translates into strategies used for the learning of new information. When people perform multiple study-test trials, judgements of learning for trial 2 rely not only on objective memory for past test performance, but also on subjective confidence in test accuracy and time allotted to trial 2 study (Hines, Hertzog, & Touron, 2013; Hines, Hertzog, & Touron, 2015). Both young and older adults are able to utilize multiple cues when monitoring performance, but substantial individual differences in each age group indicate that cue use can be highly variable.​

Mind wandering in older adulthood

I have more recently developed a line of research investigating adult age differences in mind wandering. Older adults mind wander less frequently compared to younger adults, a finding that appears contrary to well-established reductions in inhibitory attention, working memory, and cognitive control. In young adults, those with better executive functioning mind wander less often, particularly when performing challenging tasks. Cognitive performance is similarly impaired for young and older adults during task-unrelated thoughts (TUTs; McVay, Meier, Touron, & Kane, 2013), which argues against the idea that mind wandering is adaptive recruitment of spare executive resources in either age group. Older adults also engage in more metacognitive “task-related interference” (TRI; i.e., evaluative thoughts) that impairs task performance similarly across age, but does not account for older adults’ overall lower rates of mind wandering. My research in this area focuses on the mechanisms that underlie these age differences in mind wandering. A recently published study validated older adults’ thought reports using eye movement comparisons for reading when on-task versus off-task (Frank, Nara, Zavagnin, Touron, & Kane, 2015). This project also provides preliminary evidence that dispositional factors might account for age differences. Specific predictors of mind wandering for young adults, such as affect, mindfulness, and task interest, were found to differ for older adults, and in some cases to partially account for age differences in mind wandering experiences. In recent work, we have shown that stereotype threat influences the experience and frequency of TRI in older adults (Jordano & Touron, in press).

Publications

You can find pdf versions of many of these papers in the UNCG NC DOCKS repository at http://libres.uncg.edu/ir/uncg/clist.aspx?id=262

  • Erb, C. D., Touron, D. R., & Marcovitch, S. (2020). Tracking the dynamics of global and competitive inhibition in early and late adulthood: Evidence from the flanker task. Psychology and Aging, 35(5), 729-743.
  • *Kuhns, J. & Touron, D. R. (2020). Schematic support increases memory strategy use in young and older adults. Psychology and Aging, 35(3), 397-410.
  • *Siri, J. & Touron, D. R. (2020). Metacognitive predictions and strategic adaptation to distractors in young and older adults. Aging, Neuropsychology, and Cognition, 27(5), 787-805.
  • *Frank, D. J. & Touron, D. R. (2019). The role of task understanding on younger and older adults’ performance. Journal of Gerontology: Psychological Sciences, 74(2), 264-274.
  • *Kuhns, J., & Touron, D. R. (2019). Aging and cognitive skill learning. In Oxford Research Encyclopedia of Psychology. Oxford University Press.
  • *Jordano, M. L. & Touron, D. R. (2018). How often are thoughts metacognitive? Findings from research on self-regulated learning, think-aloud protocols, and mind-wandering. Psychonomic Bulletin & Review, 25(4), 1269-1286.
  • Maillet, D., Beaty, R. E., *Jordano, M. L., Touron, D. R., Silvia, P. J., Kwapil, T. R., Turner, G. R., Spreng, R. N., & Kane, M. J. (2018). Age-related differences in mind-wandering in daily life. Psychology and Aging, 33(4), 643-653.
  • Hartley, A., Didierjean, A., Maquestiaux, F., Angel, L., Castel, A., Geraci, L., Hazeltine, E., Lemaire, P., Ruthruff, E., Taconnat, L., Thevenot, C., & Touron, D. (2018). Successful aging: The role of cognitive gerontology. Experimental Aging Research, 44(1), 82-93.
  • * Jordano, M. L. & Touron, D. R. (2017). Stereotype threat as a trigger of mind wandering in older adults. Psychology and Aging, 32(3), 37-313.
  • *Kuhlmann, B. G. & Touron, D. R. (2017). Relate it! Objective and subjective evaluation of mediator-based strategies for improving source memory in younger and older adults. Special issue of Cortex on the Cognitive Neuroscience of Source Monitoring, 91, 25-39.
  • *Hinault, T., Lemaire, P. & Touron, D. R. (2017). Strategy combination during execution of memory strategies in young and older adults. Memory, 25 (5), 619-625.
  • *Hinault, T., Lemaire, P. & Touron, D. R. (2017). Aging effects in sequential modulations of poorer strategy effects during execution of memory strategies. Memory, 25(2), 176-186.
  • *Kuhlmann, B. G. & Touron, D. R. (2016). Aging and memory improvement from semantic clustering: The role of list presentation format. Psychology and Aging, 31(7), 771-785.
  • *Frank, D. J., *Jordano, M., *Browne, K. P., & Touron, D. R. (2016). Older adults’ use of retrieval strategies in everyday life. Gerontology, 62(6), 624-635.
  • Touron, D. R. (2016). Automaticity and skill in late adulthood. Chapter in Nancy A. Pachana (Ed.), Encyclopedia of Geropsychology. New York: Springer.
  • Rawson, K. A. &. Touron, D. R. (2015). Preservation of memory-based automaticity in reading tasks for older adults. Psychology and Aging, 30(4), 809-823.
  • Hines, J. C., Hertzog, C., & Touron, D. R. (2015). Younger and older adults weigh multiple cues in a similar manner to generate judgments of learning. Aging, Neuropsychology, and Cognition, 22(6), 693-711.
  • Touron, D. R. (2015). Memory avoidance in older adults: When ‘old dogs’ won’t perform their ‘new tricks.’ Current Directions in Psychological Science, 24(3), 170-176.
  • *Frank, D. J., *Nara, B. J., *Zavagnin, M., Touron, D. R., & Kane, M. J. (2015). Validating older adults’ reports of less mind-wandering: An examination of eye- movements and dispositional influences. Psychology and Aging, 30, 266-278.
  • Touron, D. R., & Herztog, C. (2014). Accuracy and speed feedback: Global and local effects on strategy use. Experimental Aging Research, 40, 332-356.
  • *Frank, D. F., Touron, D. R., & Herztog, C. (2013). Age differences in strategy shift: Retrieval avoidance of general shift reluctance? Psycholgy and Aging, 28, 778-788.
  • *Hines,, J., Hertzog, C., & Touron, D. R. (2013).  Judgments of learning are influenced by multiple cues in addition to memory for past test accuracy. Archives of Scientific Psychology, 1, 23-32.
  • Rummel, J., Kuhlmann, B. G., & Touron, D. R. (2013). Performance predictions affect attentional processes of event-based prospective memory. Consciousness and COgnition, 22, 729-741.
  • *MacVay, J., *Meier, M. E., Touron, D. R., & Kane, M. J. (2013). Does aging ebb the flow of thought? Exploring age-related changes in  mind-wandering, executive control, and self-evaluation. Acta Psychologica, 142, 136-147.
  • *Frank, D. F., Touron, D. R., & Hertzog, C. (2013). Age differences in strategy shift: Retrieval avoidance or general shift reluctance? Psychology and Aging, 28, 778-788.
  • *Kuhlmann, B. G. & Touron, D. R. (2012). Mediator-based encoding strategies in source monitoring in young and older adults. Journal of Experimental Psychology: Learning, Memory, and Cognition, 38, 1352-1364.
  • *Hines, J., Hertzog, C., & Touron, D. R. (2012). A prelearning manipulation falsifies a pure associational deficit account of retrieval shift during skill acquisition. Aging, Neuropsychology, and Cognition, 19, 449-478.
  • Hertzog, C. & Touron, D. R. (2011) Age differences in memory retrieval shift: Governed by feeling-of-knowing? Psychology and Aging, 26, 647-660.
  • Touron, D. R., Hertzog, C., & Frank, D. (2011). Eye movements and strategy shift in skill acquisition: Adult age differences. Journal of Gerontology: Psychological and Social Sciences, 62B, 151-159.
  • *Kuhlmann, B. & Touron, D. R. (2010). Older adults’ use of metacognitive knowledge in source monitoring: Spared monitoring but impaired control. Psychology and Aging, 26,143-149.
  • Mitzner, T. L., Touron, D. R., Rogers, W. A., & Hertzog, C. (2010). Checking it twice:Age-related differences in double checking during visual search. Proceedings of the Human Factors and Ergonomics Society 54th Annual Meeting. San Francisco, CA: Human Factors and Ergonomics Society.
  • Touron, D. R., Hertzog, C., & *Speagle, J. Z. (2010). Subjective learning discounts test type: Evidence from an associative learning and transfer task. Experimental Psychology, 57, 327-337
  • Touron, D. R., Oransky, N., *Meier, M. E., & *Hines, J. C. (2010). Metacognitive monitoring and strategic behavior in working memory performance: An examination of adult age differences. Quarterly Journal of Experimental Psychology, 63, 1533-1551.
  • Touron, D. R. & Hertzog, C. (2009). Age differences in strategic behavior during a computation-based skill acquisition task. Psychology and Aging, 24, 574-585.
  • Rawson, K. A. &. Touron, D. R. (2009). Age-related differences in practice effects during reading comprehension: Older adults are slower to shift from computation to retrieval. Psychology and Aging, 24, 423-437.
  • *Hines, J., Touron, D. R., & Hertzog, C. (2009). Metacognitive influences on study time allocation in an associative recognition task: An analysis of adult age differences. Psychology and Aging, 24, 462-475.
  • Hertzog, C., Touron, D. R., & *Hines, J. (2007). Does a time monitoring deficit influence older adults’ delayed retrieval shift during skill acquisition? Psychology and Aging, 22, 607-624.
  • Touron, D. R., *Swaim, E., & Hertzog, C. (2007). Moderation of older adults’ retrieval reluctance through task instructions and monetary incentives. Journal of Gerontology: Psychological Sciences, 62B, 149-155.
  • Touron, D. R. (2006). Are item-level strategy shifts abrupt and collective? Age differences in cognitive skill acquisition. Psychonomic Bulletin & Review, 13, 781-786.
  • Touron, D. R., Hoyer, W. J., & Cerella, J. (2004). Age-related differences in the componentprocesses of cognitive skill learning. Psychology and Aging, 19, 565-580.
  • Touron, D. R., & Hertzog, C. (2004). Distinguishing age differences in knowledge, strategy use, and confidence during strategic skill acquisition. Psychology and Aging, 19, 452-466.
  • Touron, D. R., & Hertzog, C. (2004). Strategy shift affordance and strategy choice in young and older adults. Memory & Cognition, 32, 298-310.
  • Hoyer, W. J., and Touron, D. R. (2002). Learning in adulthood. Chapter in J. Demick & C. Andreoletti (Eds.), Handbook of adult development. New York: Kluwer Academic Publishers.
  • Touron, D. R., Hoyer, W. J., & Cerella, J. (2001). Cognitive skill acquisition and transfer in younger and older adults. Psychology and Aging, 16, 555-563.
  • Verhaeghen, P. Palfai, T., Cerella, J., Buchler, N., Johnson, M., D’Eredita, M., Touron-Green, D., Hoyer, W. J., & Makekau, M. (2001). Age-related dissociations in time-accuracy functions for recognition memory: Utilizing semantic support versus building new representations. Aging, Neuropsychology, and Cognition, 7, 260-272.​​

* indicates student author