Engineering Commons^™

An Analysis Of The Influence Of Age And Ionizing Radiation On Cognitive Performance, Elizabeth L. Gerhardt

Master's Theses - Daytona Beach

This thesis was designed to study whether age has a significant effect on cognitive test results among persons exposed to ionizing radiation. The data for this investigation came from the fourth year of a 1995-98 longitudinal study of subjects exposed to radiation from the 1986 Chernobyl, Ukraine, nuclear power plant accident. Accuracy and efficiency scores from four cognitive tests taken by 84 Ukrainian volunteers were divided into two age groups and three radiation dosage groups for analysis. The results of this study found that decrements in human performance on tasks involving spatial processing increase with age in persons who have …