Brain Imaging in Fetal Alcohol Exposed Delinquents

描述（由申请人提供）：产前接触酒精与一系列广泛的行为和认知障碍有关，包括注意力缺陷和一般智力下降。有人认为，酒精暴露的个人表现出更多的犯罪行为，在刑事司法系统中比例过高。然而，关于酒精暴露对不良青少年的影响的研究很少，特别是关于酒精暴露引起的脑损伤如何可能为破坏性行为的病因提供信息。目前的建议旨在使用功能神经成像来检查胎儿酒精暴露不良行为中反应抑制执行功能缺陷的假设作用。具体来说，拟议的研究将调查酒精暴露与非暴露的青少年额叶皮质下功能的完整性

DESCRIPTION (provided by applicant): Prenatal exposure to alcohol is associated with a wide array of behavioral and cognitive impairments, including attention deficits and decreases in general intelligence. It has been suggested that alcohol exposed individuals exhibit increased delinquent behavior and are overrepresented in criminal justice systems. However, there is little research on the effects of alcohol exposure in delinquent youth, particularly with regard to how alcohol-exposure induced brain damage might inform the etiology of disruptive behaviors. The current proposal aims to use functional neuroimaging to examine the hypothesized role of response inhibition executive functioning deficits in fetal alcohol-exposed delinquents. Specifically, the proposed study will investigate the integrity of frontal-sub cortical functioning in alcohol-exposed versus non-exposed juvenile delinquents by using a standard disinhibition (go no-go) neuroimaging task. This project will help to characterize the neural correlates associated with both delinquency and prenatal alcohol exposure, and will investigate the degree to which fetal alcohol exposure discriminates among delinquent neurocogntive profiles.