ABSTRACT
One of the major accomplishments of neuropsychological studies in the 1970s and 1980s was a new understanding of the functions of the frontal lobe of mammals. Once seen as the seat of human intelligence, the frontal lobe has come to be understood as a region that exerts ‘‘executive control’’ of cognitive functions both in human and nonhuman mammals. Although the detail of exactly what the frontal lobe is doing is still a matter of serious debate, there is a general consensus that the frontal lobe functions to organize behavior in space and time (Fuster, 1998; Kolb, 2007). Damage to the frontal lobe in adulthood thus produces significant disturbance
of executive functions (EF) (for a review, see Kolb & Whishaw, 2003). The effects of damage to the frontal lobe during development are less well-understood but there is considerable evidence that the chronic behavioral effects of frontal injury vary with the age-at-injury. The goal of this chapter is to review studies on laboratory animals, and especially rats, in which precise developmental age has been manipulated and both functional and anatomical outcome has been examined. In addition, we shall consider treatments that can modify the age-dependent effects of early cortical injuries. We begin, however, with a brief overview of the effects of frontal injury in children (see Anderson, Jacobs, & Harvey, this volume).
