Frontal Lobes, Prefrontal Cortex, and Executive Functions

Vocabulary practice flashcards covering frontal lobe neuroanatomy, prefrontal cortical subregions, executive function models, developmental trajectories, and related clinical syndromes based on lecture material.

Primary Motor Cortex (M1 / BA 4)

The precentral cortical area responsible for specifying elementary movements (such as mouth and limbs), movement force, and direction, which projects directly to subcortical motor structures like the basal ganglia, red nucleus, and spinal cord; damage causes loss of fine movements, speed, and strength.

Dorsal Premotor Cortex (PMd)

A subsector of the premotor cortex that is active for selecting and choosing movements from an individual's stored movement repertoire (movement lexicon).

Ventral Premotor Cortex (PMv)

A premotor sector containing conscious mirror neurons that recognize others' movements and help select matching or distinct motor actions.

Frontal Eye Field (FEF / BA 8, 8a)

A frontal region that receives visual inputs from the posterior parietal region PG and the superior colliculus to plan and control voluntary eye movements prior to execution; lesions cause deficits in voluntary eye gaze.

Dorsolateral Prefrontal Cortex (dlPFC / BA 9, 46)

A prefrontal region reciprocal to posterior parietal regions and the superior temporal sulcus (STS) that governs working memory, temporal memory, planning, problem-solving, and top-down guidance of attention.

Orbitofrontal Cortex (OFC / BA 11, 12, 13, 47)

A ventral prefrontal division that receives sensory projections from all modalities, projects to the amygdala and hypothalamus, regulates autonomic emotional states, and mediates inhibitory control over immediate gratification and risk assessment.

Ventromedial Prefrontal Cortex (vmPFC / BA 10, 11, 12, 13, 14, 25, 32)

A prefrontal region interconnected with the dlPFC, posterior cingulate, amygdalar nuclei, hypothalamus, and periaqueductal gray (PAG) that gives meaning to emotions, maintains goals, regulates motivation, and directs emotional conduct.

Anterior Cingulate Cortex (ACC / BA 24, 25)

A frontal division involved in emotional processing, error monitoring, and response evaluation that signals conflict and anticipates performance before an error is made.

Salience Network

A large-scale neural network characterized by correlated activity among the anterior cingulate cortex, supplementary motor cortex, and anterior insular cortex, which activates when significant external stimuli demand a behavioural adaptation.

Temporal Memory

The capacity to record recent occurrences and maintain their sequential order (working memory) under the guidance of the dlPFC to generate internal rules that direct behavior.

Autonoetic Awareness

The awareness of personal self-continuity across time, linking autobiographical experiences to current actions and future goals; disrupted by lesions to ventral or medial frontal structures.

Frontal Lobe Functional Lateralization

Hemispheric specialization where the left frontal lobe governs task setting and verbal processing, whereas the right frontal lobe mediates task monitoring and nonverbal processing.

Pseudodepression

A condition associated with left frontal lobe lesions characterized by apathy, lack of motivation, blunted affect, reduced spontaneous speech, and diminished interest in social relationships.

Pseudopsychopathy

A condition associated with right frontal lobe lesions characterized by immature and disinhibited behavior, impulsivity, inappropriate language, and deficient social judgment.

Wisconsin Card Sorting Test (WCST)

A neuropsychological task requiring subjects to discover and switch sorting rules (by color, shape, or number) based on feedback; failure to shift strategies leads to perseveration, particularly following left dlPFC (area 9) damage.

Supervisory Attentional System (SAS)

A theoretical model proposed by Norman & Shallice where a deliberate top-down supervisory system intervenes during non-routine, novel, troubleshooting, dangerous, or temptation-resisting tasks to bias action selection over automatic schema units.

Contention Scheduling

The lower-level automatic mechanism in the Norman & Shallice model that coordinates schema control units through mutual inhibition, neurobiologically linked to the basal ganglia/striatum dopaminergic system.

Central Executive

In Alan Baddeley's working memory model, the attentional controller responsible for focusing, dividing, and switching attention, metaphorically characterized as a 'homunculus' that makes critical decisions.

Executive Function (Muriel Deutsch Lezak's Definition)

A psychological construct referring to the capacity to formulate goals, plan their execution, and carry them out effectively.

Three-Factor Latent Model of Executive Functions (Miyake et al., 2000)

An empirical latent variable framework that fractionates executive function into three distinct yet correlated components: Shifting (Plus-Minus, Number-Letter, Local-Global), Updating (Keep Track, Tone Monitoring, Letter Memory), and Inhibition (Antisaccade, Stop-Signal, Stroop).

Cascade of Control Model (Marie T. Banich)

A hierarchical executive processing model stating that posterior dlPFC biases task-relevant processes, mid-dlPFC biases task representations, posterior dorsal ACC selects guide information, and anterior dorsal ACC evaluates the completed response.

Guided Activation Theory of PFC (Miller & Cohen, 2001)

A neurocomputational framework stating that the prefrontal cortex functions as a maintenance and biasing system that preserves goal representations and biases competitive pathways toward task-relevant actions in novel or interfering situations.

Frontal Cortico-Subcortical Connections

Neural pathways linking the frontal lobe to subcortical structures, featuring unidirectional projections to the striatum (caudate and putamen), bidirectional loops with the mediodorsal thalamus, and direct links to the hypothalamus and mesencephalon.

Frontal Lobe Maturation Direction (Gogtay et al., 2004)

The spatio-temporal progression of cortical development wherein the frontal lobe matures in a back-to-front trajectory, with the left prefrontal cortex maturing earlier than the right prefrontal cortex.

Sex-Specific Prefrontal Gray Matter Peak (Giedd et al., 1999)

The pre-adolescent structural inflection point where frontal lobe gray matter reaches maximum volume before pruning begins, peaking at age $11$ in females and age $12.1$ in males.

Developmental Fractionation

The neurodevelopmental process wherein broadly shared and undifferentiated neural networks in early childhood gradually separate into specialized, functionally distinct neural circuits with age.

Abulia

A clinical syndrome of profound apathy, lethargy, hypophonia, loss of initiative, and delayed response latencies, commonly caused by bilateral or dorsolateral prefrontal pathology or tumors.

Luria's Frontal Apparatus (1973)

Alexander Luria's definition of the frontal lobes as the essential apparatus for organizing intellectual activity as a whole, including the programming of the intellectual act and the checking of its performance.