ADHD in Girls: Neuroimaging and Executive Behavior

描述（由申请人提供）：有证据表明，患有多动症的女孩与患有多动症的男孩最显著的不同是：1)学业和社会情感；2)神经生物学特征。基于先前关于男孩多动症神经生物学特征的研究经验，本研究将重点关注女孩多动症的神经生物学特征，并计划从定量体积/解剖磁共振成像（aMRI）和执行行为评估中获得数据，包括运动/眼球运动和认知行为。考虑到性别因素，患有多动症的女孩将与对照组女孩以及患有和没有多动症的男孩进行比较。所有200名受试者（每组50名）的年龄范围为9.0至11.5岁；此外，即使在这么小的年纪，坦纳分期也会被考虑在内。解剖MRI感兴趣的区域将是额叶、基底神经节和小脑。假设ADHD女孩与男孩在额叶水平（仅表现出异常不对称）和基底节区水平（表现出对称较小的尾状核和白球总体积）上存在差异，而与男孩有相同的大脑和后下蚓部总面积减少。行为任务，包括运动/眼动和认知，将被分类为抑制控制、反应准备和工作记忆，这些功能被认为代表平行的额纹状体和小脑联锁回路。假设ADHD女孩在反应准备和工作记忆方面相对较弱，而在抑制方面相对较弱，与ADHD男孩相反。将分析按性别划分的亚型与aMRI和行为数据集的相互作用以及情绪症状的影响。受性别影响的脑-行为关系（如上所述，由协变量修改）将根据ADHD的神经发育模型进行解释。

DESCRIPTION (provided by applicant): There is evidence that girls with ADHD differ from boys with ADHD most strikingly in 1) academic and social-emotional and 2) neurobiological features. Building upon previous research experience concerning neurobiological features of boys with ADHD, this proposal focuses on 2) neurobiology of girls with ADHD, with plans to derive data from quantitative volumetric/anatomic magnetic resonance imaging (aMRI) and assessments of executive behaviors, both motor/oculomotor and cognitive. To take gender into account, girls with ADHD will be compared with control girls as well as boys with and without ADHD. The age range for all 200 subjects (50 in each group) will be 9.0 through 11.5 years; in addition, even at this young age, Tanner staging will be taken into consideration. Anatomic MRI regions of interest will be frontal lobe, basal ganglia, and cerebellum. It is hypothesized that girls with ADHD will differ from boys with ADHD at the levels of frontal lobe (showing anomalous asymmetry only), and at the level of the basal ganglia (showing symmetrically smaller total caudate and globus pallidus volumes) while sharing with boys total cerebral and posterior inferior vermis reductions. Behavioral tasks, motor/oculomotor as well as cognitive, will be categorized into inhibitory control, response preparation, and working memory, functions thought to represent parallel frontostriatal and cerebellar interlocking circuits. It is hypothesized that girls with ADHD will be relatively more impaired in terms of response preparation and working memory than in terms of inhibition, a profile opposite to that of boys with ADHD. Gender-by-subtype interactions with respect to aMRI and behavioral datasets and the impact of emotional symptoms will be analyzed. Brain-behavior relationships as influenced by gender (modified by covariates as noted above) will be interpreted in terms of a neurodevelopmental model of ADHD.