title: Audience effects on the neural correlates of relational reasoning in adolescence.
abstract: Adolescents are particularly sensitive to peer influence. This may partly be due to an increased salience of peers during adolescence. We investigated the effect of being observed by a peer on a cognitively challenging task, relational reasoning, which requires the evaluation and integration of multiple mental representations. Relational reasoning tasks engage a fronto-parietal network including the inferior parietal cortex, pre-supplementary motor area, dorsolateral and rostrolateral prefrontal cortices. Using functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI), peer audience effects on activation in this fronto-parietal network were compared in a group of 19 female mid-adolescents (aged 14-16 years) and 14 female adults (aged 23-28 years). Adolescent and adult relational reasoning accuracy was influenced by a peer audience as a function of task difficulty: the presence of a peer audience led to decreased accuracy in the complex, relational integration condition in both groups of participants. The fMRI results demonstrated that a peer audience differentially modulated activation in regions of the fronto-parietal network in adolescents and adults. Activation was increased in adolescents in the presence of a peer audience, while this was not the case in adults.
authors.affiliation: UCL, Institute of Cognitive Neuroscience, 17 Queen Square, London WC1N 3AR, UK; Department of Psychological Sciences, Birkbeck, University of London, Malet Street, London WC1E 7HX, UK.
authors.forename: Iroise
authors.initials: I
authors.lastname: Dumontheil
authors.affiliation: UCL, Institute of Cognitive Neuroscience, 17 Queen Square, London WC1N 3AR, UK.
authors.forename: Laura K
authors.initials: LK
authors.lastname: Wolf
authors.affiliation: UCL, Institute of Cognitive Neuroscience, 17 Queen Square, London WC1N 3AR, UK. Electronic address: s.blakemore@ucl.ac.uk.
authors.forename: Sarah-Jayne
authors.initials: SJ
authors.lastname: Blakemore
mesh_terms: D000293:Adolescent; D000328:Adult; D000704:Analysis of Variance; D001921:Brain / Q000254:growth & development* / Q000502:physiology*; D001931:Brain Mapping; D002560:Cerebrovascular Circulation / Q000502:physiology; D005260:Female; D006801:Humans; D008279:Magnetic Resonance Imaging; D009483:Neuropsychological Tests; D010100:Oxygen / Q000097:blood; D010379:Peer Group; D000297:Psychology, Adolescent; D011930:Reaction Time; D012919:Social Behavior; D013850:Thinking / Q000502:physiology*; D055815:Young Adult
chemical_list: D010100:Oxygen
keywords: Adolescence; Audience effect; FMRI; Peer influence; Reasoning