Poster No:
1309
Submission Type:
Abstract Submission
Authors:
Julia Schmidgen1, Stephan Bender1, Kerstin Konrad2
Institutions:
1University Hospital Cologne, Cologne, Germany, 2University Hospital Aachen; Forschungszentrum Jülich, Aachen; Jülich, Germany
First Author:
Co-Author(s):
Kerstin Konrad
University Hospital Aachen; Forschungszentrum Jülich
Aachen; Jülich, Germany
Introduction:
The motor system shows a prolonged development throughout childhood and adolescence. The analysis of the contingent negative variation (CNV) provides valuable insights into various cognitive and motor processes, underlying cortical sources, and their development across the lifespan. The negative CNV potential is generated between a warning stimulus and a behaviorally relevant imperative stimulus that requires a fast button press. It allows to temporally disentangle response selection and early response preparation processes (early CNV) from the pre-activation of motor networks (late CNV). Currently, it remains unclear which cortical sources contribute to response selection and early response preparation in young children. This study explores cortical sources of motor network preactivation and developmental disparities in individuals aged 5 to 16 years.
Methods:
We recorded EEG activity of a sample of 46 healthy right-handed children and adolescents, aged 5 to 16 years, using a 64-electrode high density sensor array. Subjects performed a CNV task with a directional warning cue, indicating the response side of the button press. To assess age related developmental differences of cortical activation, analyses of slow cortical potentials, cortical source analysis and event-related desynchronization within the alpha band were applied.
Results:
Children showed increased reaction times and performed significantly more errors compared to adolescent subjects.The orienting response (early CNV) of young children (5- to 8-year-olds) was dominated by sensory post-processing of the directional warning stimulus reflected as pronounced cortical activity over posterior areas and showed only small mid-frontocentral activity, allocated by source analysis to the supplementary motor area (SMA). With increasing age, SMA activity became more prevalent and was recruited with a reduced latency. Significant contralateral alpha band desynchronization was found to be present in all age groups. Alpha rhythm during motor pre-activation (late CNV) showed decreasing event-related synchronization over ipsilateral and increasing event-related desynchronization over contralateral central areas with age. In contrast to studies investigating adult subjects, our adolescent sample (13- to 16-year-olds) showed no contralateral cortical activity during motor pre-activation yet.
Conclusions:
The investigated data indicate a prolonged development of motor control up into adulthood. Behavioral results indicated less-efficient action pre-processing and a lack of inhibitory control. Besides increasing efficiency in action control, activation of mid-frontocentral areas related to the supplementary motor area becomes more prevalent during processes of motor preparation and response evaluation with increasing age. The results supported the hypothesis of a developmental shift from a reactive to a proactive control and an immaturity of supplementary-, pre- and primary motor areas until late adolescence or early adulthood.
Lifespan Development:
Early life, Adolescence, Aging
Normal Brain Development: Fetus to Adolescence 1
Motor Behavior:
Motor Planning and Execution 2
Neuroanatomy, Physiology, Metabolism and Neurotransmission:
Normal Development
Novel Imaging Acquisition Methods:
EEG
Keywords:
Cortex
Development
Electroencephaolography (EEG)
Motor
Source Localization
1|2Indicates the priority used for review
Provide references using author date format
Schmidgen, J. (2023), 'Tracing Motor Preparation and Activation in the Developing Brain'