Prenatal Drug Exposure: Effects on the Adolescent Brain and Behavior Development

Objective- To use fMRI to compare brain activity at rest and during working memory and decision making tasks in normal children and in children exposed in utero to drugs of abuse. Study population- All participants will be 12-17 year-olds enrolled in an ongoing longitudinal follow up study of children exposed to drugs of abuse in utero funded by NIH. A subgroup of this study cohort will be invited to participate based on added criteria needed for scanning studies, such as absence of metal in the body, no significant CNS disease, and ability to tolerate the scanning environment. Design- Participants will undergo fMRI scans while performing a working memory task, a decision making task and at rest. Data from participants in the current study will be combined with those from a previous study (NIDA protocol 417) which now reside in our repository protocol, 8002. Outcome measures- The primary outcome measures will be the difference in BOLD fMRI activation between drug-exposed participants and those without prenatal exposure to drugs of abuse.