The decline in cognitive abilities related to operational coding can reduce the performance of elderly individuals in their daily activities.

The decline in the operational effects of elderly individuals may be related to a decrease in their ability to process mental representations. This study aims to determine whether the decline in mental representation processing is the main reason for the reduction in operational effects. In Experiment 1, participants were asked to use three different encoding methods: operational, mental representation, and verbal encoding, in order to remember noun phrases. The results showed that the operational effects of elderly individuals under the mental representation encoding condition were significantly lower than those of young people. This indicates that the role of mental representation encoding in enhancing operational effects is much weaker in elderly individuals compared to young people. In Experiment 2, two additional encoding methods were introduced: operational + viewing and mental representation + viewing. The study explored the impact of enhanced mental representation processing on operational effects. It was found that mental representation processing had a significant effect on improving operational effects…