Maturational trajectories of neurophysiological indices of inhibitory control in typically developing children

Abstract

The development of cognitive control during childhood is characterized by progressive improvements in attentional processing and response inhibition. The present study examined neural activity associated with visual attention and inhibitory control in typically developing children aged 6–12 years, using quantitative high-density electroencephalography (HD-EEG). A total of 172 typically developing children aged 6–12 years participated in the study. Participants completed a computerized Go/NoGo task while EEG activity was recorded. Behavioral performance, event-related potentials (ERPs), and time-frequency EEG features were analysed, including median frequency (MF), spectral entropy (SE), and relative power (RP) in the theta (θ) and beta1 (β1) frequency bands. Differences were observed both between task conditions and across age groups. P300 amplitude and latency decreased linearly with age across conditions. NoGo trials elicited larger P300 amplitudes and longer latencies than Go trials. Time-frequency analyses showed reductions in MF and SE with increasing age. During task performance, RP (θ) increased and RP (β1) decreased relative to the pre-stimulus baseline. These time-frequency changes were observed across all age groups but were more pronounced in older children. All time-frequency measures differentiated Go and NoGo trials, with stronger effect observed during NoGo trials. These patterns suggest that with age, children become progressively more capable of synchronizing their frequency-specific neural activity to meet the functional demands of the task. Together, these findings indicate that HD-EEG biomarkers are useful to study the maturation of large-scale coordination mechanisms and inhibitory control networks across childhood.