DEVELOPMENTAL COGNITIVE NEUROSCIENCE (TERESA FARRONI)

We will consider questions such as: What is the nature of developmental change? What are the brain mechanisms underlying cognitive, perceptual, social, and emotional development during infancy and childhood? We will also evaluate implications of findings from developmental cognitive neuroscience for broader scientific issues including nature vs. nurture, critical periods in development, and the modularity of mental functions. An integral part of the course will be careful consideration of the major methods of developmental cognitive neuroscience including functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI), recordings of evoked response potentials (ERPs), and behavioral marker tasks. We will devote particular attention to the unique challenges of applying these methods to the study of infants and children in typical and atypical development.