Simulate your senses: Exploring the impact of sensory-focused episodic future simulation on subsequent memory in younger and older adults

Abstract

Episodic future simulation allows people to plan and prepare for the future. Previous research has shown that positive episodic future simulation can bias subsequent memory for positive details in overlapping narratives in younger adults, but not older adults. Therefore, questions remain regarding whether this simulation-related memory bias extends beyond emotional information to other core features of episodic events, such as sensory detail, and whether age-related reductions in this bias reflect a broader reduction in the influence of future simulation on later memory, or the emotional content used in previous studies. The present study examined whether sensory-focused episodic future simulation influences response bias for sensory details in later overlapping narratives, and whether this effect differs between younger and older adults. Younger and older adults imagined future events with a focus on sensory information, before later reading overlapping narratives describing how those events occurred. Recognition memory was then tested for sensory and emotion/thought narrative details. Sensory-focused simulation did not produce a more liberal response bias for sensory details in either younger or older adults. Instead, younger adults were more conservative overall, whereas older adults were more liberal overall, regardless of simulation condition or detail type. Our findings suggest that simulation-related memory bias may not generalise straightforwardly from emotional to sensory information. More broadly, the present study provides novel insight into the cognitive consequences of episodic future simulation by identifying a possible boundary condition on its influence over later memory, while also broadening understanding of how age-related changes in future simulation may interfere with the way imagined events shape later cognition.