Department of Educational Neuroscience, Faculty of Psychology and Education & LEARN! Institute, VU University Amsterdam, The Netherlands.
Dev Cogn Neurosci. 2013 Jul;5:63-70. doi: 10.1016/j.dcn.2012.12.002. Epub 2013 Jan 11.
The transition from late adolescence to young adulthood is marked by anatomical maturation of various brain regions. In parallel, defining life changes take place, such as entrance into college. Up till now research has not focused on functional brain differences during this particular developmental stage. The current cross-sectional fMRI study investigates age differences in cognitive control by comparing late adolescents, 18-19 years old, with young adults, 23-25 years old. Seventy-four male and female medical students carried out a combined cognitive and emotional Stroop task. Overall, lateral frontoparietal and medial parietal activation was observed during cognitive interference resolution. Young adults showed stronger activation in the dorsomedial prefrontal cortex, left inferior frontal gyrus, left middle temporal gyrus and middle cingulate, compared to late adolescents. During emotional interference resolution, the left precentral and postcentral gyrus were involved across age and sex. The dorsomedial prefrontal cortex and precuneus were activated more in young adults than in late adolescents. No sex-related differences were found in this homogeneous sample. The results suggest that the neural bases of cognitive control continue to change between late adolescence and young adulthood.
从青少年晚期到青年早期的转变标志着大脑各个区域的解剖成熟。与此同时,也会发生一些定义生命的变化,比如进入大学。到目前为止,研究还没有关注这个特定发育阶段的大脑功能差异。目前这项横断面 fMRI 研究通过比较 18-19 岁的青少年晚期和 23-25 岁的年轻人,研究认知控制的年龄差异。74 名男女医学生进行了一项结合认知和情绪 Stroop 任务的研究。总的来说,在认知干扰解决过程中观察到了外侧额顶叶和内侧顶叶的激活。与青少年晚期相比,年轻人在背侧前额叶皮质、左额下回、左颞中回和中扣带回表现出更强的激活。在情绪干扰解决过程中,左右中央前回和中央后回在各年龄段和性别中都有涉及。年轻人的背侧前额叶皮质和楔前叶比青少年晚期激活更多。在这个同质样本中没有发现与性别相关的差异。研究结果表明,在青少年晚期和青年早期之间,认知控制的神经基础仍在不断变化。