Effects of pubertal timing on EEG coherence and P3 latency

Neurodevelopmental approaches to schizophrenia emphasise the role of late brain maturational events. Abnormalities here may account for both the putative cortico-cortical underconnectivity in schizophrenia and its typical onset in late adolescence. Saugstad hypothesised that maturational rate at puberty may lead to an extension of normal maturational processes such as synaptic pruning. In extreme late maturers pruning was thought to be prolonged, leading to reduced numbers of synapses and an increased risk for schizophrenia. Here we assessed the effects of pubertal timing extremes on EEG coherence and P3 latency as putative measures of brain development in N = 37 healthy adults. During photic stimulation late maturing males showed increased left-hemispheric coherence compared with male early maturers. This was in line with earlier findings (Kaiser, J., Gruzelier, J.H., 1996. Timing of puberty and EEG coherence during photic stimulation. Int. J. Psychophysiol. 21, 135-149). As expected, P3 latency was shorter in late compared with early maturers. However, this was true only for females, whereas there was no difference in males. These results are consistent with the notion of an exaggeration of normal maturational changes in slow maturation, whereby the underlying process appears to be different for males and females.