THE ROLE OF PREFRONTAL CORTEX IN THE COGNITIVE DYSFUNCTIONS OF SCHIZOPHRENIA

这个项目的目的是促进我们对角色的理解 多巴胺（DA）和前额叶皮层（PFC）的紊乱在 导致精神分裂症患者的认知缺陷 基本 该中心的科学项目将研究解剖学和生理学， 内源性前额叶皮层回路及其DA和 其他单胺。 在这个项目中，我们将解决这些角色， 系统在人类行为中发挥作用， 在精神分裂症中观察到。 这些研究的动机是一系列 并行分布式处理（PDP）模型， PFC的计算功能，其通过DA神经调节的调节，以及 精神分裂症患者这一系统的紊乱。 这些模型表明 行为抑制和记忆这两种功能 被视为不同的，和分离的功能PFC -可以简单地 是PFC所服务的单个基础过程的两个特征： 表示和维护选择任务所需的信息 适当的反应（上下文信息）。 这一假设使得 关于认知缺陷的eh模式的具体预测， 在评估受试者表现情境的能力的任务中观察到 信息，在时间延迟上维护此信息，并使用它 来抑制竞争性反应 此外，它还预测 赤字的模式在疾病过程中应该如何演变。 该项目的主要目标是测试这些预测， 行为研究（认知和眼动任务，以及 神经心理学评估），并继续发展 它们所基于的计算模型，受到新的 行为和生物数据。

The purpose of this project is to advance our understanding of the role that disturbances of dopamine (DA) and prefrontal cortex (PFC) play in producing the cognitive deficits observed in schizophrenia. The basic science projects in this Center will study the anatomy and physiology of intrinsic prefrontal cortical circuitry, and its modulation by DA and other monoamines. In this project, we will address the role that these systems play in human behavior, and in producing cognitive deficits observed in schizophrenia. The studies are motivated by a series of parallel distributed processing (PDP) models that address the computational function of PFC, its regulation by DA neuromodulation, and the disturbance of this system in schizophrenia. These models suggest that behavioral inhibition and memory - two functions that have often been treated as distinct, and dissociable functions of PFC - may simply be two features of a single underlying process subserved by PFC: the representation and maintenance of information needed to select task appropriate responses (context information). This hypothesis makes specific predictions about eh pattern of cognitive deficits that should be observed in tasks that assess subjects' ability to represent context information, maintain this information over temporal delays, and use it to inhibit competing responses. Furthermore, it makes predictions about how the pattern of deficits should evolve over the course of illness. The primary goal of this project will be to test these predictions in behavioral studies (cognitive and eye-movement tasks, and neuropsychological assessments), and to continue to develop the computational models upon which they are based, constrained by new behavioral and biological data.