The lesion methodology: contrasting views from adult and child studies

A traditional approach for examining brain-behavior relations has been the lesion method. This method assumes a direct correspondence between the cognitive process compromised and the site of lesion. Historically, studies with adults have used this framework to map brain functions. In contrast, studies of children with early injury have addressed quite different issues. Developmental animal lesion studies and pediatric neuropsychology studies have focused on the level of plasticity exhibited following early injury. Resilency in behavioral development has suggested change in the underlying neural substrate. A new set of studies has applied converging, MRI-based methods to examine anatomical and functional development in intact brain regions following early injury and compared these data with behavioral outcomes on the same children. The findings reveal an interaction between early injury and normal mechanisms of development, which manifest as atypical behavioral, structural, and functional development.