Evaluating a Fronto-Basal-Ganglia White-Matter Network for Behavioral Stopping in Lesion Patients

我们如何才能不让自己分心？我们如何克服我们的强迫症、抽搐和不适当的冲动？这些都是关于认知控制的问题。很好地理解这种控制背后的心理和神经机制，对于日常生活的许多方面以及基础科学都是至关重要的。研究认知控制的一个卓有成效的方法是研究人们如何停止已经启动的反应。停止已经启动的反应可能是我们停止日常生活中各种冲动的方式的一个实验模型。最近的研究表明，停止是通过大脑中的几个关键“节点”实现的。节点之间的通信很可能是通过远程连接(白质束)进行的。在国家科学基金会的支持下，亚当·阿伦博士和他的研究团队将测试这一想法，即停车行为背后的远程联系网络。这种方法有两个方面：首先，使用一种形式的神经成像来测量健康年轻人样本中连接的强度，并检查连接强度的变化与停止行为能力的个体差异之间的关系；其次，成像特定脑损伤患者的连接。如果特定的连接是停止的关键，那么即使关键的大脑节点本身完好无损，这些连接的损坏也会产生停止的问题。总体而言，这些研究将利用最近开发的大脑连接分析方法，揭示大脑关键区域之间的连接网络如何构成人类控制的新信息。它们与认知神经科学的最新发展是一致的，认知神经科学强调连接的重要性，而不仅仅是大脑区域本身。这项资助的工作将补充Aron博士实验室的活动，这些活动已经在多个阶段对科学教育产生了影响，包括在圣地亚哥地区的学校开展外联活动，在实验室接待少数族裔学生，以及本科生和研究生教学。这项工作为阿伦博士的实验室和科室引入了新的科学成分，从而增加了独特的教育价值：包括对脑损伤患者的研究，以及分析大脑连接的方法。总体而言，计划中的实验可能会产生关于停止的神经结构的信息，这对人类发育、法学和神经精神病学等不同领域都有影响。大脑连接的改变，可能与发育迟缓、疾病或损伤有关，可能会导致抑制不适当行为的缺陷。各种神经精神障碍，如注意力缺陷、抽动障碍、暴饮暴食和药物滥用，可能与停顿背后的大脑连接发生变化有关。

How are we able to prevent ourselves from being distracted? How can we overcome our compulsions, tics and inappropriate urges? These are questions about cognitive control. A good understanding of the psychological and neural mechanisms underlying such control is of paramount importance for many aspects of everyday life as well as for basic science. A fruitful way to study cognitive control is to examine how people stop already initiated responses. Stopping an already initiated response could be an experimental model for the way in which we stop all kinds of urges in everyday life. Recent research suggests that stopping is achieved by several key "nodes" in the brain. It is likely that communication between the nodes occurs via long-range connections (white matter tracts). With support from the National Science Foundation, Dr. Adam Aron and his research team will test this idea of a network of long-range connections underlying stopping behavior. The approach is twofold: first, to use a form of neuroimaging to measure the strength of the connections in a sample of healthy young adults, and to examine how variations in the strength of the connections relates to individual differences in the behavioral ability to stop; second, to image the connections in patients with specific brain injuries. If particular connections are key for stopping, then damage to these connections will produce problems with stopping even when the key brain "nodes" themselves are intact. Overall, these studies will harness recently-developed methods for the analysis of brain connections to reveal novel information about how the network of connections between key brain regions underlies human control. They are in keeping with recent developments in cognitive neuroscience which emphasize the importance of connections rather than just brain regions themselves. The funded work will complement activities in Dr. Aron's laboratory which already have an impact on science education at multiple stages, including outreach activities in San Diego area schools, hosting of minority students in the lab and undergraduate and graduate teaching. The work adds unique educational value by introducing new scientific components into Dr. Aron's lab and department: these include the study of patients with brain lesions and methods for analyzing brain connections. Overall, the planned experiments could yield information about the neural architecture of stopping that has implications for diverse domains such as human development, jurisprudence and neuropsychiatry. Alterations in brain connections, perhaps related to developmental delays, disease, or injury, could lead to deficits in inhibiting inappropriate actions. Various neuropsychiatric disorders, such as attention deficits, tic disorders, over-eating and substance abuse may relate to alterations in the brain connections underlying stopping.