Pro- and antisaccades in children elicited by visual and acoustic targets - does modality matter?

Background: Children are able to inhibit a prepotent reaction to suddenly arising visual stimuli, although this skill is not yet as pronounced as it is in adulthood. However, up to now the inhibition mechanism to acoustic stimuli has been scarcely investigated

Methods: Reflexive (prosaccade) and inhibitory (antisaccade) responses to visual and acoustic targets were examined with an eye tracker system in 31 children between seven and twelve years of age using a gap-overlap task and two target eccentricities.

Results: Acoustically cued saccades had longer reaction times than visually cued saccades.

Medio-frontal and anterior temporal abnormalities in children with attention deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD) during an acoustic antisaccade task as revealed by electro-cortical source reconstruction.

Background: Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder (ADHD) is one of the most prevalent disorders in children and adolescence. Impulsivity is one of three core symptoms and likely associated with inhibition difficulties. To date the neural correlate of the antisaccade task, a test of response inhibition, has not been studied in children with (or without) ADHD.