[The development of attention, memory and the inhibitory processes: the chronological relation with the maturation of...

Development during childhood and adolescence is characterized by greater efficiency in performing cognitive tasks. The correlations between cognitive and brain development are not altogether clear and have not been studied in depth. The aim of this study is to survey the research carried out into the development of cognitive functioning in children, adolescents and adults, and its chronological relation with brain development. Anatomofunctional and cognitive-behavioural studies are presented. Anatomical studies have shown that the white matter increases linearly throughout childhood and adolescence, whereas cortical and subcortical grey matter increases in the pre-adolescent period and later diminishes in the post adolescent stage. It has been claimed that these changes are regional and that the prefrontal cortex (PFC) is one of the last areas to mature. Functional research has studied cognitive processes attributed to the functioning of the PFC, such as attention, working memory and the inhibition of irrelevant responses. The findings from these studies have shown a behavioural and physiological development of these three processes during childhood and adolescence. Behavioural results have evidenced greater efficiency in capacities such as discriminating between relevant and irrelevant information, storing and handling information in the memory and the inhibition of unsuitable responses during the performance of a task. The physiological results have presented changes in the magnitude, spread and integration of the regions activated during task performance. Cognitive and behavioural maturation is consecutive to structural and physiological maturing and this is produced in a chronologically and qualitatively different way in the distinct regions of the brain.