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Summary Developmental Neuropsychology
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Extensive summary of Developmental Neuropsychology. Passed the exam with a grade 8.7 using this summary!
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Summary Developmental Neuropsychology500880-M-6
2024/2025
Summary of course material
Saskia Kriege
,Developmental Neuropsychology
Week 1 – Pregnancy and Birth: Preterm birth and Cerebral Palsy
Clip 1 - The Developing Brain During Pregnancy
Rapid brain growth: fetus
- Critical stages of brain development regarding brain growth and connectional
specificity occur during pregnancy
- Primitive forms of neuronal networks found in fetal brain
- Anatomical structures are present at birth
Early brain development
Characteristics:
1. Hierarchical
Cerebellar (back of head between cerebellum and
brain stem) → posterior (back of brain) → anterior
(front of brain)
Brain areas develop after each other
2. Additive and regressive
Many brain processes increase over time
Adding over what’s already there (myelination =
additive)
Myelination = formation of myelin sheath around nerve to allow
improved conduction
Other processes inverse development; initial overproduction and the selective
reduction (synaptogenesis followed by synaptic pruning = regressive)
Synaptogenesis = formation of synapses between neurons
Synaptic pruning = extra neurons and synaptic connections are
eliminated to increase efficancy of neuronal transmissions
3. In growth spurts
Most processes are not linear but happen in growth spurts → leading to
overproduction and later pruning
- Sensitive/critical periods
Windows of risk or opportunity
Prenatal Period
Different then book →
,Book myelination after birth, but happens in final trimester
First and second → creating a brain, third about making connections (white and grey
matter developing)
Damage in this period → structural damage (morphology)
Postnatal Period
- Growth spurt in dendrites
Number and length in dendrites increases, number of neurons doesn’t
increase
- Synaptogenesis
More dendrites = more connections, more synapses
- Myelination = white matter (increased processing speed)
Increases processing speed
Damage mostly impacts function of the brain (interconnections and functional
networks). The structure is already there.
Early disruptions
- Injury: direct or too few nutrients/oxygen
- Maternal (mental) health: severe depression/anxiety, infections, sickness
- Environmental: exposure to toxins, smoking, drug use
- Genetic disorders
Rapid growth: strength or vulnerability?
- Strength
Immature brains extremely plastic, able to recover better.
Children greater improvement after brain injury
Plasticity = young brain less differentiated and more capable of transferring
functions from damaged tissue to health tissue
Equipotentional = view that all brain regions are equally able to take
responsibility for any function (contrast = innate specialization, every function
has own place in the brain)
- Vulnerability
Dramatic developmental processes lead to brain being extremely sensitive to
to environmental influences early in life
Critical periods → brain damage within window may be more detrimental
Functional plasticity may only be restricted to certain sensitive periods. Can
have it but at certain periods
The recovery continuum model
Plasticity -----------------------→ vulnerability
Good recovery poor recovery
Dependent on age/how bad
, Cognitive Reserve Model
Interaction of multiple factors
Brain reserve capacity = morphology you already have
Cognitive reserve capacity = function you already have
(page 6 book)
Early brain damage – difference
Developmental stage of certain skills at time of insult:
- Emerging skills
Not fully functional, early stage
- Developing skills
Partially acquired abilities, not fully functional
- Established skills
Matured abilities, functional
Normal development → healthy children also vary in ability on cognitive tasks
Adjust tasks on age
Children may grow into deficits in later developmental stages.
Initially few deficits, but runs in trouble when developing skills at more advanced level
- Type of insult
More widespread brain damage causes less specific impairments.
More general disturbances in different domains
Children have less functionalities, not specialized yet
- Recovery trajectory
Difficult prognoses in early injury
- Testing
Cannot assume that adult neuropsychological tests measure same skills in
children
Rey’s complex Figure
Testing motor skills? Attention skills?
Factors impacting recovery
- Injury factors
U-shape → large, unilateral lesions better dan mediate (smaller), diffuse
(widespread) lesions
Diffuse worse than focal (single location)
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