| dc.description.abstract | Cognitive abilities of primates, including humans, continue to develop during adolescence. Maturation of working memory in particular is considered one of the hallmarks of human cognitive development. Grasping its core mechanisms and how such functions emerge and develop leads to comprehending cognition. Similarities in brain structure and function set the stage to utilize the non-human primates (NHP) as an animal model to investigate the neural mechanisms underlying working memory maturation during adolescence. Studies in this dissertation constructed a multilevel longitudinal dataset of monkey adolescent development. This study established NHP as a model to relate the development of cognitive capacity to changes in body growth, brain development, and prefrontal neural activity that mirrors the progression of normative working memory ability observed in humans during adolescence. A maturation age wad defined to serve as a more objective indicator of pubertal stages for canonical developmental progress. The studies in this dissertation demonstrated the similar nonlinear maturational trajectories of physical measures, cognitive function and prefrontal cortex (PFC) neuronal properties, characterized by rapid and statistically significant development in early adolescence before stabilizing. The studies in this dissertation also investigated the depth distribution of PFC neurophysiological changes during adolescence and showed that neurophysiological changes are not confined to superficial layers. Additionally, this dissertation also investigated the changes of response inhibition in developing monkeys, which is another important cognitive function that matures over adolescence. These changes denote improved control of attention, memory, and other cognitive mechanisms during development. | |
