• Investigated Echo State Networks’ (ESN) abilities to predict time-series data of varying complexity. • Identified the effects of neural network size, level of connectivity, and spectral radius on network performance. • Developed MATLAB algorithms to evolve the ESN through the implementation of anti-Oja neural plasticity rules. • Designed novel algorithms in MATLAB for the selective update of neuron connections in ESNs based on perceived neuron importance from a pre-training phase.