THE EMERGENCE OF COGNITIVE CONTROL

描述(由申请人提供)：注意和注意的重要和相关结构 执行职能(EF)本身由多种技能和操作组成，并且 受多个制约因素的影响。我们将通过以下方式研究认知的控制 对比环境限制、经验限制和执行限制在不同物种和不同儿童发展中的效力。之前的研究表明，猴子和人类成年人在导致注意力外源性或内源性转移的变量影响方面存在可靠的表现差异。似乎有理由认为，猴子的表现模式也可能是其他注意力--特别是执行的、有动机的、有目的的注意力控制--不成熟或缺乏注意力的个体的典型特征。这些发现强调了将这项研究扩展到学龄前儿童和接受和不接受语言训练的黑猩猩的必要性。本研究的目的是比较地阐明构成注意力和EF的因素的性质和数量，并确定这些因素与认知的其他方面如学习、记忆和语言之间的关系。此外，非侵入性成像技术的使用 生化分析被提出用来阐明大脑与行为的关系，这些关系是注意力和相关结构的基础，特别是那些与注意力控制的变化相对应的关系。我们还将调查培训和其他干预措施，以提高猴子、黑猩猩、儿童和成年人的执行注意力能力。总而言之，这些结果将有助于对注意力和EF的统一观点，该观点整合了跨物种和跨寿命的数据。我们预计，这些发现将对个体和群体在注意力和EF方面的差异进行评估和补救，包括那些有助于注意力缺陷或执行困难综合征诊断的差异。

DESCRIPTION (provided by applicant): The important and related constructs of attention and executive function (EF) are each themselves comprised of multiple skills and operations, and are subject to influence by multiple sources of constraint. We will examine the control of cognition by contrasting the potency of environmental constraints, experiential constraints, and executive constraints across species and across child development. Previous research suggests reliable performance differences between monkeys and human adults in the effects of variables that result in exogenous or endogenous shifts in attention. It seems reasonable to suggest that the pattern of performance for the monkeys may also be typical of other individuals for whom attention-and specifically the executive, motivated, purposive control of attention-is immature or otherwise deficit. These findings underscore the need to extend the research to preschool children and to chimpanzees with and without language training. This research is further designed to elucidate comparatively the nature and number of factors that comprise attention and EF and to identify the relation between these factors and other aspects of cognition like learning, memory, and language. Additionally, the use of noninvasive imaging techniques and biochemical assays are proposed to elucidate the brain-behavior relations that underlie attention and related constructs, and particularly those that correspond to variations in the control of attention. We will also investigate training and other interventions that might result in improved capacity for executive attention by monkeys, chimpanzees, children, and adults. Together, these results will contribute to a unified perspective on attention and EF that integrates data across species and across the lifespan. We anticipate that the findings will have implications for the assessment and remediation of individual and group differences in attention and EF, including those differences that contribute to attention-deficit or dysexecutive-syndrome diagnoses.