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Development of abstract thinking during childhood and adolescence: The role of rostrolateral prefrontal cortex

Rostral prefrontal cortex (RPFC) has increased in size and changed in terms of its cellular organisation during primate evolution. In parallel emerged the ability to detach oneself from the immediate environment to process abstract thoughts and solve problems and to understand other individuals’ tho...

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Detalles Bibliográficos
Autor principal: Dumontheil, Iroise
Formato: Online Artículo Texto
Lenguaje:English
Publicado: Elsevier 2014
Materias:
Acceso en línea:https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC6987955/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/25173960
http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.dcn.2014.07.009
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author Dumontheil, Iroise
author_facet Dumontheil, Iroise
author_sort Dumontheil, Iroise
collection PubMed
description Rostral prefrontal cortex (RPFC) has increased in size and changed in terms of its cellular organisation during primate evolution. In parallel emerged the ability to detach oneself from the immediate environment to process abstract thoughts and solve problems and to understand other individuals’ thoughts and intentions. Rostrolateral prefrontal cortex (RLPFC) is thought to play an important role in supporting the integration of abstract, often self-generated, thoughts. Thoughts can be temporally abstract and relate to long term goals, or past or future events, or relationally abstract and focus on the relationships between representations rather than simple stimulus features. Behavioural studies have provided evidence of a prolonged development of the cognitive functions associated with RLPFC, in particular logical and relational reasoning, but also episodic memory retrieval and prospective memory. Functional and structural neuroimaging studies provide further support for a prolonged development of RLPFC during adolescence, with some evidence of increased specialisation of RLPFC activation for relational integration and aspects of episodic memory retrieval. Topics for future research will be discussed, such as the role of medial RPFC in processing abstract thoughts in the social domain, the possibility of training abstract thinking in the domain of reasoning, and links to education.
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spelling pubmed-69879552020-02-03 Development of abstract thinking during childhood and adolescence: The role of rostrolateral prefrontal cortex Dumontheil, Iroise Dev Cogn Neurosci Review Rostral prefrontal cortex (RPFC) has increased in size and changed in terms of its cellular organisation during primate evolution. In parallel emerged the ability to detach oneself from the immediate environment to process abstract thoughts and solve problems and to understand other individuals’ thoughts and intentions. Rostrolateral prefrontal cortex (RLPFC) is thought to play an important role in supporting the integration of abstract, often self-generated, thoughts. Thoughts can be temporally abstract and relate to long term goals, or past or future events, or relationally abstract and focus on the relationships between representations rather than simple stimulus features. Behavioural studies have provided evidence of a prolonged development of the cognitive functions associated with RLPFC, in particular logical and relational reasoning, but also episodic memory retrieval and prospective memory. Functional and structural neuroimaging studies provide further support for a prolonged development of RLPFC during adolescence, with some evidence of increased specialisation of RLPFC activation for relational integration and aspects of episodic memory retrieval. Topics for future research will be discussed, such as the role of medial RPFC in processing abstract thoughts in the social domain, the possibility of training abstract thinking in the domain of reasoning, and links to education. Elsevier 2014-08-12 /pmc/articles/PMC6987955/ /pubmed/25173960 http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.dcn.2014.07.009 Text en © 2014 Published by Elsevier Ltd. http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/3.0/ This is an open access article under the CC BY-NC-ND license (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/3.0/).
spellingShingle Review
Dumontheil, Iroise
Development of abstract thinking during childhood and adolescence: The role of rostrolateral prefrontal cortex
title Development of abstract thinking during childhood and adolescence: The role of rostrolateral prefrontal cortex
title_full Development of abstract thinking during childhood and adolescence: The role of rostrolateral prefrontal cortex
title_fullStr Development of abstract thinking during childhood and adolescence: The role of rostrolateral prefrontal cortex
title_full_unstemmed Development of abstract thinking during childhood and adolescence: The role of rostrolateral prefrontal cortex
title_short Development of abstract thinking during childhood and adolescence: The role of rostrolateral prefrontal cortex
title_sort development of abstract thinking during childhood and adolescence: the role of rostrolateral prefrontal cortex
topic Review
url https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC6987955/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/25173960
http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.dcn.2014.07.009
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