Deck 9: Decisions, Goals, and Actions

Question 1

The term "silent lobes" has been used for the frontal lobes because they

A) Are not involved in speech production
B) "Silence" other lobes of the brain through inhibition
C) Rarely communicate with other lobes
D) Do not have an easily defined function

Answer 1

D

Question 2

"Memories of the future" refers to the ability to make plans and then to follow them to guide behavior, saving mental images of the future to memory. This ability is a characteristic of what makes humans_______ beings rather than______ compared to other mammals.

A) Counteractive, active
B) Responsive, reactive
C) Active, reactive
D) Reflective, counteractive

Answer 2

Active, reactive

Question 3

Neuroimaging studies of healthy individuals and studies of individuals with frontal lobe brain damage have provided differing 'pictures' of the functions of the frontal lobes. How do they differ and why do you think this difference occurs?

Answer 3

Neuroimaging studies of healthy individuals have provided detailed information about specific regions in the prefrontal cortex PFC) and their role in human cognition. Throughout the past decade or so, more and more information has been provided by these studies so that at present, there are models of the functions of the PFC that show how specific regions interact with other brain regions in tasks involving working memory, voluntary attention, and executive control. While these neuroimaging studies provide many details of localized functional regions in the PFC, a different picture is provided when looking at the deficits that occur when an individual has suffered brain damage to the PFC. Generally, the deficits that occur are complex and effect many aspects of cognition. While frontal lobe syndromes are described, such as the dorsolateral or the orbitofrontal syndromes, in general highly specific deficits are not observed with frontal lobe damage. How do we combine the findings across neuroimaging and brain damage studies? This is a central goal of cognitive neuroscience. At present, our best approach for providing a unified account of frontal lobe function across studies of healthy and brain damaged individuals is to understand that frontal lobe damage likely causes a cascade of damage across local and widespread regions such that the deficits may be more complex and less specific. On the other hand, the findings from neuroimaging studies provide key information about how specific and localized regions in the PFC process information when they are undamaged and intact.

Question 4

Two common frontal lobe syndromes are

A) Blindsight and Alzheimer's disease
B) Anterograde and retrograde amnesia
C) Dorsolateral and orbitofrontal syndromes
D) Agnosia and prosopagnosia

Question 5

Executive control in the brain is described as

A) Both localized and highly distributed
B) Relying upon the medial temporal lobes
C) Both adaptive and veridical
D) Rarely impaired by brain damage

Question 6

To study mental flexibility in patients with frontal lobe impairments you would likely use

A) Cognitive bias task
B) Blindsight task
C) Visual search task
D) Wisconsin Card Sorting task

Question 7

"Mental flexibility" refers to the

A) Capacity to respond to unanticipated events
B) Ability of the cortex to develop new cells throughout the lifetime, even after brain damage
C) Ability to decode ambiguous events
D) Brain's large-capacity cognitive processes

Question 8

Which of these involve the prefrontal cortex?

A) You scan your bedroom looking for your black sweater.
B) You decide that you want to go bowling Friday night.
C) You make a new year's resolution to eat healthier.
D) All of the above

Question 9

How is mental flexibility important in everyday life? What brain regions - when damaged - produce mental rigidity?

Question 10

Which of the following is not one of the major portions of the prefrontal cortex PFC)?

A) Ventromedial
B) Dorsolateral
C) Rostrocaudal
D) Orbitofrontal.

Question 11

The three brain networks underlying attention described by Posner and colleagues are:

A) Working memory, attention, and volitional control
B) Alerting, orienting, and executive
C) Conscious, unconscious, and intuitive
D) Attention, alerting, and recalling

Question 12

Humans, primates, dolphins and whales all have large brains. What differences might you expect to find?

A) An enlarged prefrontal cortex in all of these animals
B) An enlarged prefrontal cortex in the primates and enlarged parietal lobe in aquatic mammals
C) An enlarged prefrontal cortex in the aquatic mammals and an enlarged parietal lobe in the primates
D) An enlarged occipitotemporal lobe in all of these animals