Motor impulsivity during childhood and adolescence: A longitudinal biometric analysis of the go/no-go task in 9- to 18-year-old twins.

Abstract

In the present study, we investigated genetic and environmental effects on motor impulsivity from childhood to late adolescence using a longitudinal sample of twins from ages 9 to 18 years. Motor impulsivity was assessed using errors of commission (no-go errors) in a visual go/no-go task at 4 time points: ages 9–10, 11–13, 14–15, and 16–18 years. Significant genetic and nonshared environmental effects on motor impulsivity were found at each of the 4 waves of assessment with genetic factors explaining 22%–41% of the variance within each of the 4 waves. Phenotypically, children’s average performance improved across age (i.e., fewer no-go errors during later assessments). Multivariate biometric analyses revealed that common genetic factors influenced 12%–40% of the variance in motor impulsivity across development, whereas nonshared environmental factors common to all time points contributed to 2%–52% of the variance. Nonshared environmental influences specific to each time point also significantly influenced motor impulsivity. Overall, results demonstrated that although genetic factors were critical to motor impulsivity across development, both common and specific nonshared environmental factors played a strong role in the development of motor impulsivity across age.

Why do depression, conduct, and hyperactivity symptoms co-occur across adolescence? The role of stable and dynamic genetic and environmental influences

“…While environmental influences contributed modestly to some of the within-time associations among depression, conduct, and hyperactivity symptoms, these common environmental influences were time specific and did not contribute to the symptom co-occurrence over time. Instead, we found that shared and non-shared environmental influences contributed only to the homotypic continuity of depression and hyperactivity, respectively, in line with previous findings from early to middle adolescence [65,66]. Most notably, majority of non-shared environmental influences were time and symptom specific, contributing to symptom discontinuity over time.…”

The Matrix Reasoning Item Bank (MaRs-IB): Novel, Open- Access Abstract Reasoning Items for Adolescents and Adults

“…Two independent, but complimentary lines of inquiry may provide insights into possible mechanisms of these developmental differences. First, developmental theories emphasize reductions in impulsivity over adolescence, which are linked to the protracted development of prefrontal regions over the same developmental period (Bezdjian et al, 2014;Brookman-Byrne, Mareschal, Tolmie, & Dumontheil, 2018;Hallquist, Geier, & Luna, 2018;Steinberg et al, 2017). Second, computational theories of speed-accuracy trade-offs highlight that the time to arrive at a cognitive solution gives insights into the amount of evidence participants sample before deciding upon a solution (Fitts, 1966;Stone, 1960 tests, which have been used for decades, also arguably carry a higher likelihood of familiarity than novel items like MaRs-IB.…”

“…These changes in reasoning performance during development have been linked to the protracted maturation of the frontal cortex (Bazargani, Hillebrandt, Christoff, & Dumontheil, 2014;Crone et al, 2009;Dumontheil, Houlton, Christoff, & Blakemore, 2010). During the same developmental period, impulsivity decreases markedly (Bezdjian, Tuvblad, Wang, Raine, & Baker, 2014;Steinberg et al, 2017), raising the possibility that increases in reasoning scores could reflect either true increases in reasoning capacity, a decrease in impulsivity, or both. In other words, there may be a developmental speed-accuracy trade-off.…”

Inhibitory control moderates the quadratic association between resting respiratory sinus arrhythmia and prosocial behaviors in children

“…IC was measured using no-go accuracy (Bezdjian, Tuvblad, Wang, Raine, & Baker, 2014). The present task was administered via E-Prime 2.0 (Psychology Software Tools, Inc., Sharpsburg, PA), and it includes 20 practice trials (10 go trials and 10 no-go trials) and 160 test trials in random order.…”