Neurocognitive correlates of problem behavior in environmentally at-risk adolescents

This study prospectively examines the correlation between neurocognitive (NC) functioning and problem behavior in early adolescence.

As part of a longitudinal study, African American urban youths of lower socioeconomic status, mean age 12.1 years (SD=1.2, n=111), were administered a battery of 16 NC tasks assessing eight NC systems (two tasks per system) including four systems primarily associated with frontal cortex and four primarily associated with nonfrontal cortex. The former systems included (1) executive cognitive functioning (ECF), (2) cognitive control, (3) working memory, and (4) reward processing. The latter systems included (5) receptive language, (6) spatial cognition, (7) visual cognition, and (8) memory. The Teacher's Report Form of the Achenbach System of Empirically Based Assessment was performed approximately at the same age that the NC assessments were performed. Bivariate correlations were calculated between the eight NC system composite scores and the externalizing scores.

Significant negative relationships were found between ECF and receptive language ability and externalizing behavior. Further analyses, using linear regression, showed that receptive language was more predictive of externalizing behavior than ECF.

Based on these results we conclude that (1) NC functioning, specifically in ECF and in receptive language systems, was associated with adolescent problem behavior and (2) receptive language was more strongly associated with problem behavior than ECF.