San Diego State University/University of California, San Diego, Joint Doctoral Program in Clinical Psychology, 6363 Alvarado Ct., Ste 103, San Diego, CA, 92120, USA.
Department of Psychology, San Diego State University, San Diego, CA, USA.
Cogn Affect Behav Neurosci. 2021 Feb;21(1):105-118. doi: 10.3758/s13415-020-00851-z. Epub 2020 Dec 2.
Although executive functioning has traditionally been studied in "cool" settings removed from emotional contexts, it is highly relevant in "hot" emotionally salient settings such as reward processing. Furthermore, brain structures related to "cool" executive functioning and "hot" reward-related processes develop simultaneously, yet little is known about how executive functioning modulates neural processes related to reward processing during adolescence, a period of time when these systems are still developing. The present study examined how performance on "cool" behavioral executive functioning measures moderates neural reward processing. Youths (N = 43, M = 13.74 years, SD = 1.81 years) completed a child-friendly monetary incentive delay task during fMRI acquisition that captures neural responses to reward anticipation and to reward receipt and omission. Performance on inhibitory control and cognitive flexibility measures, captured outside the scanner, was used to predict brain activation and seed-based connectivity (ventral striatum and amygdala). Across analyses, we found that executive functioning moderated youths' neural responses during both reward anticipation and performance feedback, predominantly with respect to amygdala connectivity with prefrontal/frontal and temporal structures, supporting previous theoretical models of brain development during adolescence. Overall, youths with worse executive functioning had more pronounced differences in neural activation and connectivity between task conditions compared with youths with better executive functioning. This study contributes to elucidating the relationship between "cool" and "hot" processes and our findings demonstrate that simple executive functioning skills moderate more complex processes that involve incorporation of numerous skills in an emotionally salient context, such as reward processing.
虽然执行功能传统上是在远离情感情境的“冷静”环境中进行研究，但它在奖励处理等“热点”情感相关情境中非常相关。此外，与“冷静”执行功能和“热点”奖励相关过程相关的大脑结构同时发展，但对于执行功能如何在青少年时期调节与奖励处理相关的神经过程知之甚少，在此期间，这些系统仍在发育。本研究探讨了“冷静”行为执行功能测量的表现如何调节与奖励处理相关的神经反应。在 fMRI 采集期间，青少年（N=43，M=13.74 岁，SD=1.81 岁）完成了一项适合儿童的货币奖励延迟任务，该任务可捕捉到对奖励预期和奖励获得与错过的神经反应。在扫描仪外进行的抑制控制和认知灵活性测量的表现用于预测大脑激活和基于种子的连接（腹侧纹状体和杏仁核）。在整个分析中，我们发现执行功能调节了青少年在奖励预期和绩效反馈期间的神经反应，主要与杏仁核与前额叶/额叶和颞叶结构的连接有关，这支持了青春期大脑发育的先前理论模型。总体而言，执行功能较差的青少年在任务条件之间的神经激活和连接方面存在更明显的差异，而执行功能较好的青少年则没有。这项研究有助于阐明“冷静”和“热点”过程之间的关系，我们的研究结果表明，简单的执行功能技能调节更复杂的过程，这些过程涉及在情感相关情境中整合许多技能，例如奖励处理。
