Major Brain Structures, Lobes, and Functional Areas: Neuroanatomy and Cognitive Functions

Frontal Lobe

Involved in decision-making, personality, and higher cognitive functions. Damage can lead to changes in behavior and personality, as seen in the case of Phineas Gage.

Parietal Lobe

Processes sensory information such as touch, temperature, and pain. It plays a crucial role in spatial awareness and navigation.

Occipital Lobe

Primarily responsible for vision. It processes visual information from the eyes and is essential for interpreting what we see.

Temporal Lobe

Involved in hearing and memory. It contains structures critical for language comprehension and memory storage.

Motor Cortex

Located in the frontal lobe, it controls voluntary movements by sending signals to the muscles.

Somatosensory Cortex

Located in the parietal lobe, it processes sensory input from the body, allowing us to perceive touch, pain, and temperature.

Broca's Area

Located in the frontal lobe, it is responsible for speech production. Damage can result in expressive aphasia, where individuals struggle to form words.

Wernicke's Area

Located in the temporal lobe, it is crucial for language comprehension. Damage can lead to receptive aphasia, where individuals can produce speech but cannot understand language.

Hippocampus

Essential for forming new memories. Patient H.M. had his hippocampus removed and could not form new memories, highlighting its role in memory formation.

Cortex

Responsible for storing long-term memories. Memories are believed to be distributed across various cortical areas.

Thalamus

Acts as a sensory relay station, directing sensory information to appropriate areas of the cortex.

Hypothalamus

Regulates basic drives such as hunger and thirst, and controls the endocrine system through hormone release.

Amygdala

Plays a key role in emotion regulation, particularly fear and pleasure responses.

Left Hemisphere

Dominant for language and logical reasoning. It is responsible for tasks involving analytical thinking and verbal communication.

Right Hemisphere

Associated with creativity and spatial abilities. It processes visual and spatial information, contributing to artistic and intuitive tasks.

Corpus Callosum

Connects the two hemispheres, allowing communication between them.

Split-brain studies

Reveal that each hemisphere can operate independently. For example, a patient may be able to name an object seen in the right visual field (processed by the left hemisphere) but not describe an object seen in the left visual field (processed by the right hemisphere).