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Inhibitory control

Cognitive process

Summary

Cognitive process

Inhibitory control, also known as response inhibition, is a cognitive process – and, more specifically, an executive function – that permits an individual to inhibit their impulses and natural, habitual, or dominant behavioral responses to stimuli ( prepotent responses) in order to select a more appropriate behavior that is consistent with completing their goals. Self-control is an important aspect of inhibitory control. For example, successfully suppressing the natural behavioral response to eat cake when one is craving it while dieting requires the use of inhibitory control.

The prefrontal cortex, caudate nucleus, and subthalamic nucleus are known to regulate inhibitory control cognition. Inhibitory control is impaired in both addiction and attention deficit hyperactivity disorder. In healthy adults and ADHD individuals, inhibitory control improves over the short term with low (therapeutic) doses of methylphenidate or amphetamine. Inhibitory control may also be improved over the long-term via consistent aerobic exercise.

Tests

An inhibitory control test is a neuropsychological test that measures an individual's ability to override their natural, habitual, or dominant behavioral response to a stimulus in order to implement more adaptive goal-oriented behaviors. Some of the neuropsychological tests that measure inhibitory control include the Stroop task, go/no-go task, Simon task, Flanker task, antisaccade tasks, delay of gratification tasks, and stop-signal tasks.

Gender differences

Females tend to have a greater basal capacity to exert inhibitory control over undesired or habitual behaviors and respond differently to modulatory environmental contextual factors relative to males. For example, listening to music tends to significantly improve the rate of response inhibition in females, but reduces the rate of response inhibition in males.

References

References

  1. (2015). "Prescription Stimulants' Effects on Healthy Inhibitory Control, Working Memory, and Episodic Memory: A Meta-analysis". J Cogn Neurosci.
  2. Diamond A. (2013). "Executive functions". Annu Rev Psychol.
  3. (2009). "Molecular Neuropharmacology: A Foundation for Clinical Neuroscience". McGraw-Hill Medical.
  4. (February 2013). "Benefits of regular aerobic exercise for executive functioning in healthy populations". Psychon Bull Rev.
  5. (2014). "Cognitive control in the self-regulation of physical activity and sedentary behavior". Front Hum Neurosci.
  6. (2010). "Neurocircuitry of addiction". Neuropsychopharmacology.
  7. (June 2015). "The Cognition-Enhancing Effects of Psychostimulants Involve Direct Action in the Prefrontal Cortex". Biol. Psychiatry.
  8. (2016). "Sex dependency of inhibitory control functions". Biol Sex Differ.
  9. (2006-05-01). "Gender differences in social representations of aggression: The phenomenological experience of differences in inhibitory control?". British Journal of Psychology.
Wikipedia Source

This article was imported from Wikipedia and is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 License. Content has been adapted to SurfDoc format. Original contributors can be found on the article history page.

neuropsychological-tests cognition addiction amphetamine attention-deficit-hyperactivity-disorder
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