medial frontal polar cortex, the bilateral dorsomedial prefrontal cortex, the left anterior cortex, and bilateral superior frontal gyri. This is important, as it shows that NF does not only affected brain responses within a specific brain region (i.e. the left amygdala), but also the processing flow within a larger network of regions. In turn, the network-based effect is important from a developmental perspective, as it would allow us to time interventive approaches to coincide with a period of substantial brain and cognitive development such as adolescence. In addition, it seems also likely that any changes to neurocognitive circuitry will have knock-on effect on behaviour that is stronger and more persistent than at other developmental stages (Cohen Kadosh et al., 2013). However, up until now, all NF-based research on emotion regulation networks has been conducted with healthy adults (Caria et al., 2010; Johnston et al., 2010; Johnston et al., 2011; Paret et al., 2014; Zotev et al., 2011) or adult patients (Linden et al., 2012; Ruiz et al., in press). The current study aimed to establish the feasibility of using NF with paediatric populations. Our main aim was to teach children and adolescents to gain control over the insula region in a simple NF up-regulation task in comparison to a rest condition. We chose the right insula region, as it is a key region in the emotion regulation network (Kohn et al., 2014; Wager and Feldman-Barrett, 2004). It is also functionally well-connected with the amygdala and PFC regions, which are all relevant for improving emotion regulation abilities during development (Gee et al., 2013; Pitskel et al., 2011). In addition, previous studies have also shown that the insula responds reliably to interventions (Pitskel et al., 2011), and particularly NF-based ones where the NF-intervention does have a more wide-spread effect on the emotion regulation network (Ruiz et al., in press). A second aim of the study was therefore to assess the wider effect of NF training on the developing emotion regulation network, and particularly on changes in bottom-up and top-down information flow between the different brain regions for the two task conditions (regulate vs rest). Methods
medial frontal polar cortex, the bilateral dorsomedial prefrontal cortex, the left anterior cortex, and bilateral superior frontal gyri. This is important, as it shows that NF does not only affected brain responses within a specific brain region (i.e. the left amygdala), but also the processing flow within a larger network of regions. In turn, the network-based effect is important from a developmental perspective, as it would allow us to time interventive approaches to coincide with a period of substantial brain and cognitive development such as adolescence. In addition, it seems also likely that any changes to neurocognitive circuitry will have knock-on effect on behaviour that is stronger and more persistent than at other developmental stages (Cohen Kadosh et al., 2013). However, up until now, all NF-based research on emotion regulation networks has been conducted with healthy adults (Caria et al., 2010; Johnston et al., 2010; Johnston et al., 2011; Paret et al., 2014; Zotev et al., 2011) or adult patients (Linden et al., 2012; Ruiz et al., in press). The current study aimed to establish the feasibility of using NF with paediatric populations. Our main aim was to teach children and adolescents to gain control over the insula region in a simple NF up-regulation task in comparison to a rest condition. We chose the right insula region, as it is a key region in the emotion regulation network (Kohn et al., 2014; Wager and Feldman-Barrett, 2004). It is also functionally well-connected with the amygdala and PFC regions, which are all relevant for improving emotion regulation abilities during development (Gee et al., 2013; Pitskel et al., 2011). In addition, previous studies have also shown that the insula responds reliably to interventions (Pitskel et al., 2011), and particularly NF-based ones where the NF-intervention does have a more wide-spread effect on the emotion regulation network (Ruiz et al., in press). A second aim of the study was therefore to assess the wider effect of NF training on the developing emotion regulation network, and particularly on changes in bottom-up and top-down information flow between the different brain regions for the two task conditions (regulate vs rest). Methods