Brain Imaging in Fetal Alcohol Exposed Delinquents

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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.