Prof. Trevor W. Robbins | Attention to Action: Fronto-striatal Substrates of Impulsivity and Compulsivity

The construct of impulsivity is considered within a neuropsychological and neuroscientific theoretical framework that considers different aspects of cognitive control, as well as its possible hierarchical organisation. One neural system, including the medial prefrontal cortex and nucleus accumbens mediates ‘waiting’ impulsivity, including premature responding in the rodent 5-choice serial reaction time task and temporal reward discounting, with dopaminergic, serotoninergic and noradrenergic modulatory influences. A second system including the dorsal striatum and associated circuitry including the inferior frontal cortex mediates inhibitory control in such tasks as the stop-signal reaction time task and is also modulated by monoaminergic systems. Several neuropsychological methods for measuring aspects of compulsivity will also be introduced based on distinct theoretical frameworks including habit based representation and impaired cognitive control. Together with various modalities of brain imaging, these are employed to characterize neurobehavioral aspects of compulsivity in patients with obsessive-compulsive disorder in comparison to other compulsive syndromes.

Poster