Individual differences in the functional neuroanatomy of inhibitory control

Abstract

We combined the data of five event-related fMRI studies of response inhibition. The re-analysis (n = 71) revealed response inhibition to be accomplished by a largely right hemisphere network of prefrontal, parietal, subcortical and midline regions, with converging evidence pointing to the particular importance of the right frontal operculum. Functional differences were observed between the sexes with greater activity in females in many of these cortical regions. Despite the relatively narrow age range (18-46), cortical activity, on the whole, tended to increase with age, echoing a pattern of functional recruitment often observed in the elderly. More absentminded subjects showed greater activ..