Developing the attentive brain: Contribution of cognitive neuroscience to a theory of attentional development Rueda Cuerva, María Del Rosario Attention Brain development cognitive development developmental cognitive neuroscience infancy Attention is a fundamental cognitive mechanism that primarily functions to regulate and organize the flow of perceptions and actions shaping our mental life. Early cognitive models have highlighted aspects of sustained, selective, and executive control as essential components of attention. These three broad aspects can be further subdivided into subordinate operations, depending on whether the particular function is mostly driven by external stimulation (bottom-up attention) or relies on endogenous processes such as voluntary intentions or expectations (top-down attention). After several decades of cognitive neuroscience research, these different functions have been associated with specific circuits of brain regions. Based on the cognitive neuroscience framework, this paper presents a theory of attention development and discusses behavioral and brain evidence regarding the development of attention function during the first years of life. 2025-02-01T10:39:47Z 2025-02-01T10:39:47Z 2024-09-03 journal article Rueda, M. R. (2024) Developing the attentive brain: Contribution of cognitive neuroscience to a theory of attentional development. Human Development, 68 (5-6): 239-254. https://doi.org/10.1159/000540464 https://hdl.handle.net/10481/101717 https://doi.org/10.1159/000540464 10.1159/000540464 eng open access Karger