Abstract
The functional architecture of prefrontal cortex is central to our understanding of human mentation and cognitive prowess. This region of the brain is often treated as an undifferentiated structure, on the one hand, or as a mosaic of psychological faculties, on the other. This paper focuses on the working memory processor as a specialization of prefrontal cortex and argues that the different areas within prefrontal cortex represent iterations of this function for different information domains, including spatial cognition, object cognition and additionally, in humans, semantic processing. According to this parallel processing architecture, the ‘central executive’ could be considered an emergent property of multiple domain-specific processors operating interactively. These processors are specializations of different prefrontal cortical areas, each interconnected both with the domain-relevant long-term storage sites in posterior regions of the cortex and with appropriate output pathways.
Subject
General Agricultural and Biological Sciences,General Biochemistry, Genetics and Molecular Biology
Reference29 articles.
1. F u n c tio n a l m a g n e tic re so n a n c e im a g in g o f fro n ta l c o rte x d u r in g p e rfo rm a n c e o f n o n -s p a tia l m e m o ry tasks;Id P.;Neuroimage,1996
2. B ad d eley A. 1986 Working memory. O x fo rd U n IV e rsity Press.
3. B ad d eley A. D . & H itc h G . 1974 W o rk in g m e m o ry . I n The psychology o f learning and motivation. Advances in research and theory (ed. G . H . B o w er) p p . 47-89. N ew Y o rk : A c a d e m ic Press.
4. A ctiv e re p re s e n ta tio n o f sh a p e a n d sp a tia l lo c a tio n in m a n;Cereb. Cortex.,1996
5. A n a to m ic o rg a n iz a tio n o f b a s o v e n tra l a n d m e d io d o rsal v isu al re c ip ie n t p re fro n ta l regions in th e rhesus m o n k ey . J;Comp. Neurol.,1988
Cited by
752 articles.
订阅此论文施引文献
订阅此论文施引文献,注册后可以免费订阅5篇论文的施引文献,订阅后可以查看论文全部施引文献