Localisation of function

• What connects the left and right hemispheres? 


  The corpus callosum (a bundle of nerves)
• Location of the motor cortex :

  Left and right frontal lobes
• Role of motor cortex :

  • Control of voluntary movements
  • Contralateral - left hemisphere controls muscles in right side of the body and vice versa
• Location of the somatosensory cortex:

  Left and right parietal lobes
• Role of the somatosensory cortex:

  • responsible for the experience of sensation
  • Receives sensory info from the skin (e.g. Pain, temp, pressure)
  • Contralateral
• Location of visual centres :

  • Left and right occipital lobes
  • Begins in the retina
  • Contralateral

  ‘Eyes in the back of your head’
• Role of visual centre:

  • sight
  • Receives and processes visual info
• Location of the auditory centre

  • Left and right temporal lobes
  • Contralateral
• Role of the Auditory Centre :

  • hearing
  • Processing hearing / acoustic info from the environment (e.g. Pitch and volume)
• Location of Broca’s area:

  Left frontal lobe
• Role of Broca’s area:

  • speech production
• Broca’s aphasia :

  • Tan Broca case study
  • Could understand and comprehend language but couldn't speak (couldn’t string a sentence together
• Location of Wernicke’s area:

  Left temporal lobe
• Role of Wernicke’s area:

  • language comprehension
  • Case study- could speak but couldn't understand/ comprehend language
• AO3- Phineas Gage (strength)

  • frontal lobe impacted personality
  • Became short tempered and rude after accident
  • Suggests the frontal lobe had a specific function of regulating mood
• AO3 - Phineas Gage (weakness)

  • subjective data
  • Relies on reports from family and friends = lack of empirical scanning techniques
  • Reduces reliability and validity
  • Lower temporal validity (is study valid over time)
• AO3- rwa (strength)

  • diagnosis and treatment
  • Receptive (wernicke’s) aphasia etc recognised in DSM
  • Mundane realism - explanation of localisation has made valuable contribution to everyday medicine / diagnosis
• AO3 - damaged areas - weakness

  • when areas are damaged, others sometimes take over functioning (plasticity)
  • We cannot say there is a sole specialised area
  • Goes against localisation as suggests
• AO3 - Lashley - weakness

  • removed 10-50% of cortex in rats
  • Made no difference to solving a maze puzzle
  • Goes against localisation because specific areas should make a difference