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Development of rostral prefrontal cortex and cognitive and behavioural disorders
Author(s) -
Dumontheil Iroise,
Burgess Paul W,
Blakemore SarahJayne
Publication year - 2008
Publication title -
developmental medicine and child neurology
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 1.658
H-Index - 143
eISSN - 1469-8749
pISSN - 0012-1622
DOI - 10.1111/j.1469-8749.2008.02026.x
Subject(s) - prefrontal cortex , neuroscience , psychology , neuroimaging , cognition , schizophrenia (object oriented programming) , grey matter , autism , developmental psychology , medicine , psychiatry , magnetic resonance imaging , white matter , radiology
Information on the development and functions of rostral prefrontal cortex (PFC), or Brodmann area 10, has been gathered from different fields, from anatomical development to functional neuroimaging in adults, and put forward in relation to three particular cognitive and behavioural disorders. Rostral PFC is larger and has a lower cell density in humans than in other primates. It also has a large number of dendritic spines per cell and numerous connections to the supramodal cortex. These characteristics suggest that rostral PFC is likely to support processes of integration or coordination of inputs that are particularly developed in humans. The development of rostral PFC is prolonged, with decreases in grey matter and synaptic density continuing into adolescence. Functions attributed to rostral PFC, such as prospective memory, seem similarly to follow a prolonged development until adulthood. Neuroimaging studies have generally found a reduced recruitment of rostral PFC, for example in tasks requiring response inhibition, in adults compared with children or adolescents, which is consistent with maturation of grey matter. The examples of autism, attention‐deficit‐hyperactivity disorder, and schizophrenia show that rostral PFC could be affected in several disorders as a result of the susceptibility of its prolonged maturation to developmental abnormalities.