Reward and Cognitive Function in Adolescent Psychopathology

Adolescence is a time when exploration, and even risk-taking, can be considered an adaptive part of the typical developmental experience. This period of enhanced risk-taking allows for new learning, particularly about the social world, and is a critical part of establishing independence. Risk-taking is a complex behavior, often considered to rely on many factors, including reward sensitivity and reward behaviors, response to punishment, and executive function skills that allow the balancing of competing factors and the selection of choices. However,  in addition to being a time of exploration and independence, adolescence is also the period of onset for many psychological disorders including schizophrenia and depression. Many such disorders include alterations in both reward and executive function, which has the potential to impact learning and exploration during this time, with ultimate effects on social function, and long term daily life function. In this talk, I will address the existing literature in this area, recent relevant work from my lab on reward function, adolescence, and psychopathology, and future directions.