[Executive function and its disorders].
BACKGROUND
Executive function is a set of cognitive operations, which are sustained by the complex activities of the frontal lobe systems. Executive function is responsible for programming, establishing goals, classifying, executing, controlling, changing, monitoring and confronting all the mental activities.


OBJECTIVE
To review and to actualize neuropsychological literature about executive function, its development, its structure, its theoretical model, its alterations in different neurological and neuropsychological disorders, and its clinical qualitative and quantitative assessments.


CONCLUSIONS
Executive function is a multidimensional construct of the cognition, which is structured and modified through the development during childhood, and which is altered during different neurological and neuropsychological disorders, and which could be evaluated in a qualitative or quantitative approaches.
Pineda
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Servicio de Neurología Clínica, Facultad de Medicina de la Universidad de Antioquia, Colombia. dpineda@epm.net.co
D003072:Cognition Disorders / Q000175:diagnosis* / Q000503:physiopathology*; D006801:Humans; D009483:Neuropsychological Tests; D017397:Prefrontal Cortex / Q000503:physiopathology*