Developmental trajectories and neural correlates of working memory in toddlerhood

This research will contribute to the understanding of the behavioural development and neural correlates of early executive function (EF) in infants and young children. At present, a wealth of methodological constraints limit what we know about EF development in toddlerhood. Despite this, current research points to the potential of early EF abilities as predictors of behavioural, cognitive and academic outcomes later in childhood. The early identification of those who go on to develop cognitive and behavioural difficulties, before the child enters the classroom, would allow for a significant period in which effective clinical or educational intervention could take place. This is of vital significance, not only to developmental researchers, clinicians and educators, but also to the lives of children and their families.

This research project will endeavour to achieve four aims:
1) To adapt and design two age-appropriate tasks for the investigation of working memory (WM) in toddlerhood (2-3 years).
2) To utilise functional near-infrared spectroscopy (fNIRS) neuroimaging technology to investigate the neural substrates of WM, and also electroencephalography (EEG) to study the neural correlates of attention and cognitive flexibility, in this under studied age group.
3) To analyse infant data from an ongoing longitudinal study in relation to my newly developed toddler WM tasks, in order to explore the developmental trajectory and neural correlates of WM from its beginnings in infancy (10 months) to the cusp of early childhood (3 years).
4) To investigate the relationship between measures of WM obtained in infancy and across toddlerhood, and children's cognitive and behavioural functioning at outcome (3 years). Through the collection of a range of outcome measures that reflect the child's adaptive functioning in home and childcare settings, I will be able to identify the developmental trajectories and neural correlates that are most associated with less optimal outcomes in early childhood.

Alongside this, I will build upon an existing collaboration between Gowerlabs Ltd. and the University of Oxford. Gowerlabs have developed the fNIRS system that I will utilise as an integral part of my project, and the company continue to provide expert knowledge and support as part of their commitment to the project and to the advancement of interdisciplinary knowledge. In order to further strengthen this partnership, I intend to undertake an internship at Gowerlabs which will enable me to gain insight into the mechanisms of this neuroimaging technique, and to develop an understanding of the fundamental processes involved in refining this technology for the co-registration of EEG with fNIRS - which, rather excitingly, will enable further investigation into the neural underpinnings of early EF processes. This internship will be substantially rewarding, as it will be a valuable opportunity to obtain interdisciplinary skills in biomedical optics and engineering, directly from the developers of the optical imaging technology I am currently using in my project. As such, an optimisation process will occur whereby with my feedback from experimental experiences, I can support Gowerlabs to adapt their technology so that researchers can truly utilise the fNIRS system for their intended purpose, be it when co-registered with EEG, or for use with infant and toddler populations. Furthermore, Gowerlabs can offer support and training that will enable me to streamline and advance my experimental design to be optimal for use with fNIRS, and also to expand my data analysis skill set in a manner that will enable me to draw accurate and meaningful conclusions from the fNIRS data collected in my project.