Development of Individual Differences in Adolescent Brain Structure and Risk | Cohen, Gilmore | $150,989

Development of Individual Differences in Adolescent Brain Structure and Risk

2024 Award: $150,989

Executive function is a critical ability that leads to better life outcomes, while low levels of executive function are a risk factor for mental illness. Therefore, characterizing neurocognitive trajectories of executive function and how they relate to future mental illness is a public health imperative. The main goal of this proposal is to identify aspects of neurocognitive trajectories from birth that predict the emergence of symptoms of mental illness in emerging adulthood. This research will move us closer to developing strategies for early identification and intervention by characterizing when and how neurocognitive trajectories related to executive function diverge to indicate risk for future mental illness.

Need/Problem: High levels of executive function are associated with greater educational attainment, job success, and overall quality of life, while low executive function is a risk factor for mental illness. An understanding of neurocognitive trajectories of executive function from birth through emerging adulthood is needed to improve early identification and the timing at which treatment would be most effective for those at risk for future mental illness.

Grant Summary: This grant leverages and extends a highly unique longitudinal dataset that includes neural and cognitive data from infancy through adolescence in participants who are at higher risk of developing mental illness than the general population due to being born to mothers with mental illness or to premature birth. By implementing longitudinal modeling, tools to characterize complex characteristics of brain function, and information about the environments in which one grew up, this grant will characterize trajectories of brain function from birth through adolescence, and will examine how they interact with environmental context to predict executive function and mental illness in emerging adulthood.

Goals and Projected Outcomes: The main goals of this grant are three-fold. First, to characterize neural and behavioral trajectories of executive function from infancy to emerging adulthood. Second, to establish how neural trajectories relate to brain function during executive function tasks in emerging adulthood. Third, to determine how and when executive function-related neural trajectories diverge in individuals who have different levels of risk for mental illness and who had different environmental experiences early in life. This research will provide the groundwork that leads to early identification and, ultimately, targeted intervention plans in youth at risk for future mental illness.