Repository | Book | Chapter

Cognitive control, which allows us to guide behavior in a planned and voluntary fashion, continues to improve through adolescence in parallel with refinements in brain processes including synaptic pruning and myelination. The adolescent period is of special significance because the shift to mature adult-level cognitive processing begins to occur and because this period is vulnerable to errors in cognitive control evident in the emergence of major psychopathologic dysfunction and in risk-taking behavior. In this chapter, we review the literature characterizing the nature of developmental change in cognitive control of behavior and its relation to the brain maturational processes that occur at this time that affect brain function. Evidence from studies characterizing developmental improvements in speed of information processing, voluntary response inhibition, and working memory indicate that the ability to have cognitive control is present early in development and what continues to improve through adolescence is the ability to use this tool in a controlled and flexible manner. Functional magnetic resonance imaging and diffusion tensor imaging studies provide evidence that concurs with behavior results, indicating that the basic circuitry that supports cognitive control, including prefron-tal systems, are on-line early in development and that a shift to increased functional integration throughout the brain underlies mature adult-level executive control. Viewed in the light of the current literature, the adolescent period is beginning to be understood as a necessary period of transition when there is a shift to integrated brain function that supports efficient and flexible control of behavior.

DOI: 10.1007/978-3-540-70573-4_13

Full citation: