ReviewCerebral cortex (New York, N.Y. : 1991)2017
Through Thick and Thin: a Need to Reconcile Contradictory Results on Trajectories in Human Cortical Development.
Review in Cerebral cortex (New York, N.Y. : 1991), 2017. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 141 papers, 5 of them syntheses that pooled it.
What it found
Each row is one number read from the abstract, on the scale the paper reported it, with its interval. Left of the dashed line favours the treatment, right favours the comparator. Under each row is the sentence it came from. New to these charts? A ten-minute tutorial.
The abstract states no effect estimate the extractor could read, or names no intervention and outcome on the map, so this paper lights no cell and moves no belief. It is still indexed, cited and linked below.
The trial behind it
Trials whose registry record cites this paper, or whose number appears in the abstract. A trial that started after this paper was published is citing it as background, not reporting it.
Neither the registry nor the abstract names a trial number. If this is a trial report, that itself is worth knowing.
Who cites it
141 citing papers in PubMed, 5 syntheses or guidelines pooled it.
- Structural covariance networks in schizophrenia: A systematic review Part II.Schizophrenia research · 2022Pooled it
- Neurodevelopmental origins of self-limiting rolandic epilepsy: Systematic review of MR imaging studies.Epilepsia open · 2021Pooled it
- Pooled it
- Biological aging in childhood and adolescence following experiences of threat and deprivation: A systematic review and meta-analysis.Psychological bulletin · 2020Pooled it
- Global and Regional Development of the Human Cerebral Cortex: Molecular Architecture and Occupational Aptitudes.Cerebral cortex (New York, N.Y. : 1991) · 2020Pooled it
- Cellular correlates of cortical thinning throughout the lifespan.Scientific reports · 2020Trial
- Methylphenidate Effects on Cortical Thickness in Children and Adults with Attention-Deficit/Hyperactivity Disorder: A Randomized Clinical Trial.AJNR. American journal of neuroradiology · 2020Trial
- Neurobehavioral correlates of obesity are largely heritable.Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America · 2018Trial
- Explainable Artificial Intelligence (XAI) in Medical Education: A Multi-Modal Framework for Enhancing Human-AI Collaboration.Research square · 2026Article
- Experience-dependent cortical plasticity in response to formal schooling: Effects on networks for reading and mathematics.Developmental cognitive neuroscience · 2026Article
- Neuroanatomical subtypes of preterm adolescents.Molecular psychiatry · 2026Article
- Convergent and divergent brain-cognition development in early adolescence.Nature communications · 2026Article
- Altered neurostructural development in magnetic resonance imaging-negative pediatric epilepsy: A large-scale multicenter study of 1919 children.Epilepsia · 2026Article
- Agreement between FreeSurfer and CAT12 Cortical Thickness Measurements: A Discovery and a Replication Study in Children/Adolescents.Brain topography · 2026Article
- Mesoscale imaging of the human cerebellum reveals converging regional specialization of its morphology, vasculature, and cytoarchitecture.Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America · 2026Article
- Brain structures and their association with executive and attentional abilities in very preterm 8-year-old children.Brain structure & function · 2025Article
- Age associations with cortical and subcortical brain structure in adolescents age 9-17.bioRxiv : the preprint server for biology · 2025Article
- Mapping the coupling between tract reachability and cortical geometry of the human brain.Nature communications · 2025Article
- Developmental Changes in Brain Cellular Membrane and Energy Metabolism: A Multi-occasionThe Journal of neuroscience : the official journal of the Society for Neuroscience · 2025Article
- A FastSurfer Database for Age-Specific Brain Volumes in Healthy Children: A Tool for Quantifying Localized and Global Brain Volume Alterations in Pediatric Patients.Brain and behavior · 2025Article
81 more citing papers are in PubMed but not listed here.
Corrections and comments
PubMed lists nothing against this paper. Absence here is not a guarantee, only a check that was made.
Authors and funding
5 authors.
Funding
Abstract
Understanding how brain development normally proceeds is a premise of understanding neurodevelopmental disorders. This has sparked a wealth of magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) studies. Unfortunately, they are in marked disagreement on how the cerebral cortex matures. While cortical thickness increases for the first 8-9 years of life have repeatedly been reported, others find continuous cortical thinning from early childhood, at least from age 3 or 4 years. We review these inconsistencies, and discuss possible reasons, including the use of different scanners, recording parameters and analysis tools, and possible effects of variables such as head motion. When tested on the same subsample, 2 popular thickness estimation methods (CIVET and FreeSurfer) both yielded a continuous thickness decrease from 3 years. Importantly, MRI-derived measures of cortical development are merely our best current approximations, hence the term "apparent cortical thickness" may be preferable. We recommend strategies for reaching consensus in the field, including multimodal neuroimaging to measure phenomena using different techniques, for example, the use of T1/T2 ratio, and data sharing to allow replication across analysis methods. As neurodevelopmental origins of early- and late-onset disease are increasingly recognized, resolving inconsistencies in brain maturation trajectories is important.
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Registered trials
Read under generation 80e0d062 · epoch 390. Bibliography from PubMed, PubMed Central and OpenAlex; grants from NIH RePORTER; trial links from ClinicalTrials.gov; estimates, votes and beliefs from the OpenQuestion graph.