Age and executive ability impact the neural correlates of race perception

Abstract

Decreased executive ability elicits racial bias. We clarified the neural correlates of how executive ability contributes to race perception by comparing young adults (YA) to a population with highly variable executive ability: older adults (OA). After replicating work showing higher race bias in OA vs YA and a negative association between bias and executive ability, a subsample of White YA and OA perceived Black and White faces and cars during functional magnetic resonance imaging. YA had higher executive ability than OA, and OA had higher variability in executive ability. When perceiving Black vs White faces, YA exhibited more dorsolateral prefrontal cortex recruitment-a region previously implicated in regulating prejudiced responses-than OA. Moreover, OA with relatively impaired executive ability had more amygdala activity toward Black faces vs OA with relatively intact executive ability, whereas responses to White faces did not differ. Both YA and OA with relatively intact executive ability had stronger amygdala-ventrolateral prefrontal cortex connectivity when perceiving Black vs White faces. These findings are the first to disentangle age from executive ability differences in neural recruitment when perceiving race, potentially informing past behavioral work on aging and race perception.

Keywords: aging; amygdala; dorsolateral prefrontal cortex; executive ability; race perception.

Fig. 1.

Providing critical conceptual replications of past behavioral work, Experiment 1a showed that OA expressed more implicit race bias than young (A), while bias correlated with executive ability (B). Error bars represent standard errors.

Fig. 2.

Age × Race interactions emerged in bilateral dlPFC activity in Experiment 1b. Replicating prior work, YA had greater activation toward Black vs White faces. However, no dissociations emerged for OA. Error bars represent standard errors.

Fig. 3.

Executive ability impacted amygdala activity among OA in Experiment 1b. OA with relatively intact executive ability had decreased amygdala activation toward Black faces relative to relatively impaired OA. Interestingly, YA did not differ from relatively impaired OA in response to Black faces. Responses to White faces were similar among YA and OA regardless of executive ability. Error bars represent standard errors.

Fig. 4.

Executive ability impacted the extent of amygdala-vlPFC connectivity when perceiving Black vs White faces in Experiment 1b. OA with relatively intact executive ability (A) and YA (B) had stronger functional connectivity between amygdala and vlPFC relative to relatively impaired OA when perceiving Black vs White faces. Error bars represent standard errors.