Regulatory brain development: Balancing emotion and cognition

Abstract

Emotion regulation is a critical aspect of children's social development, yet few studies have examined the brain mechanisms involved in its development. Theoretical accounts have conceptualized emotion regulation as relying on prefrontal control of limbic regions, specifying the anterior cingulate cortex (ACC) as a key brain region. Functional magnetic resonance imaging in 5- to 11-year-olds during emotion regulation and processing of emotionally expressive faces revealed that older children preferentially recruited the more dorsal “cognitive” areas of the ACC, while younger children preferentially engaged the more ventral “emotional” areas. Additionally, children with more fearful temperaments exhibited more ventral ACC activity while less fearful children exhibited increased activity in the dorsal ACC. These findings provide insight into a potential neurobiological mechanism underlying well-documented behavioral and cognitive changes from more emotional to more cognitive regulatory strategies with increasing age, as well as individual differences in this developmental process as a function of temperament. Our results hold important implications for our understanding of normal development and should also help to inform our understanding and management of emotional disorders.

Keywords:

• Emotion regulation
• Development
• fMRI
• Anterior cingulate
• Temperament

Acknowledgments

We thank S. Dewhurst, M. Donovan, S. Haas, A. J. Hawthorne, C. Hudac, K-J. Jung, S. Kurdilla, S. Shade, and D. Vizlay for their assistance with programming, subject recruitment, data collection, and analysis. We are grateful to Marc Lewis and his colleagues for allowing us the use and adaptation of their emotion regulation task and to the children and families who devoted their time to participation in our study. Funding was provided by an R21 Network Grant (MH0704780), a Career Development Award from the National Institute of Mental Health (MH071284), and a John Merck Scholars award to Kevin Pelphrey. Susan Perlman is now at the University of Pittsburgh Medical Center.