Probing the Neural Basis of Visual Working Memory in Early Development

 描述（由申请人提供）：工作记忆被称为智能行为的核心，而这种关键认知系统的核心特性是其高度有限的容量。工作记忆容量限制与许多基本认知形式的个体差异可靠地相关（例如，语言和数学能力）和工作记忆缺陷的风险人群中，包括被诊断患有注意力缺陷/多动症、自闭症和早产儿。考虑到这些影响，了解工作记忆容量限制的发展具有广泛的意义，可能是至关重要的干预工作与发育中的儿童。这项资助的重点是开发一种称为视觉工作记忆（VWM）的中央类型的工作记忆。VWM在许多视觉认知中起着关键作用，比较无法同时观察的感知，并在世界发生变化时识别它们。研究表明，VWM在婴儿期和5岁之间显着发展，最近的VWM动态神经场（DNF）模型已经正式确定了VWM能力在早期发展中如何变化以及为什么这种变化在不同任务中变化的候选神经机制。该补助金的一个关键目标是在神经和行为层面上测试这一理论。特别是，我们将进行6个月至4.5年的加速纵向研究。在每个年龄段，儿童将完成两个功能神经成像会议和一个结构神经成像会议。我们将使用这些数据来检查：（1）DNF模型是否捕获了从6个月到4.5年的VWM表现的个体发育轨迹;（2）DNF模型是否预测了早期发育中VWM脑网络的功能变化;以及（3）DNF参数随发育的变化是否可以通过VWM网络内髓鞘含量的局部变化来解释。这项资助的结果将为我们的方法的扩展奠定基础，以检查高危人群的纵向变化。这项工作还将促进一种创新的方法，以个性化的干预指导下的VWM的神经过程模型，说话的大脑和行为的个体差异。

 DESCRIPTION (provided by applicant): Working memory has been dubbed the heart of intelligent behavior, and a core property of this critical cognitive system is its highly limited capacity. Working memory capacity limitations are reliably associated with individual differences in many basic forms of cognition (e.g., language and mathematical abilities), and working memory deficits have been observed in at-risk populations, including children diagnosed with attention-deficit/hyperactivity disorder, autism, and children born preterm. Given these influences, understanding the development of working memory capacity limits has broad implications and may be critical to intervention efforts with atypically developing children. This grant focuses on the development of a central type of working memory called visual working memory (VWM). VWM plays a key role in much of visual cognition, comparing percepts that cannot be simultaneously viewed and identifying changes in the world when they occur. Research has shown that VWM develops dramatically between infancy and 5 years old, and a recent dynamic neural field (DNF) model of VWM has formalized a candidate neural mechanism for how VWM capacity changes in early development and why such changes vary across tasks. A key goal of the grant is to test this theoretical account at neural and behavioral levels. In particular, we will conduct an accelerated longitudinal study from 6 months to 4.5 years. At each age, children will complete two functional neuroimaging sessions and a structural neuroimaging session. We will use these data to examine: (1) whether the DNF model captures individual developmental trajectories in VWM performance from 6 months to 4.5 years; (2) whether the DNF model predicts functional changes in the VWM brain network in early development; and (3) whether changes in DNF parameters over development are explained by localized changes in myelin content within the VWM network. Results from this grant will set the stage for extensions of our approach to examine longitudinal changes in at-risk populations. This work will also foster an innovative approach to individualized interventions guided by a neural process model of VWM that speaks to individual differences in both brain and behavior.