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Sexual Differentiation Of The Prefrontal Cortex In Humans: Examining Behavioural Sex Differences And The Modulatory Role Of Androgens, Kelly L. Evans

Electronic Thesis and Dissertation Repository

Sex hormones are important factors in the establishment of sex differences in the brain and behaviour during the prenatal developmental period and during adulthood. One brain area that has received little attention with respect to the study of sex differences is the prefrontal cortex (PFC). The PFC is involved in cognitive functions not limited to working memory, reinforcement learning, and inhibitory control. Currently, our understanding of the hormonal modulation of the PFC by sex steroids is also limited. The overall objectives of the present thesis were: to test the hypothesis that select cognitive functions known to depend on the PFC …

Exploring The Neural Basis Of Top-Down Guided Action In Macaque Monkeys, Jessica M. Phillips

Electronic Thesis and Dissertation Repository

To thoroughly characterize any brain mechanism requires an appropriate animal model for invasive studies. An invaluable model system used toward a comprehension of cognitive neurophysiology is the macaque monkey. It is important to delineate similarities and limitations for this model in relation to the human brain and cognition. In this thesis, we have thus conducted three experiments to investigate putative generalizations between monkeys and humans regarding the neural processes associated with top-down action control in monkeys.

Our daily behaviour is largely comprised of automatic routine actions. The frequent repetition of certain behaviours in response to particular contexts can give rise …