Reaction Time as a Function of Age and Behavioral Predisposition to Coronary Heart Disease

Open Access
Publisher Website
Google Scholar
Abstract
Performance on simple and choice reaction time (RT) tasks was studied in relation to age and behavioral predisposition to coronary heart disease (CHD). Using the Standard Situation Interview, 24 Type A (coronary-prone) subjects and 24 Type B (non-coronary-prone) subjects were identified. In the absence of clinical CHD, the Type A subjects had significantly longer response latencies in both simple and choice RT and were disproportionately slower in choice RT than Type B subjects, after the effect due to age was covaried out of the data. Additionally, it was found that extreme RTs in the Type A group may have heavily contributed to the observed group differences. Curvilinearity was found for regressions of simple and choice RT on age for both groups. Alternative biological, gero-mimetic, and activation explanations of the findings are presented. The presence of extreme RTs and curvilinearity are discussed in terms of selective dropout of healthy subjects.

This publication has 0 references indexed in Scilit: