Asymmetric functional roles of right and left ventromedial prefrontal cortices in social conduct, decision-making, and emotional processing.

Full Abstract

The aim of this study was to begin to parse the relative contributions of the right and left ventromedial prefrontal cortices (VMPC) in regard to social conduct, decision-making, and emotional processing. We hypothesized that the right VMPC is a critical component of the neural systems that subserve such functions, whereas the left VMPC is not. Seven participants with focal, stable unilateral lesions to the right (n = 4) or left (n = 3) VMPC were studied with procedures designed to measure social conduct, decision-making, and emotional processing and personality. The right-sided participants had profound disturbances of social and interpersonal behavior and of the ability to maintain gainful employment; they had defective performance and impaired anticipatory skin conductance responses during the Gambling Task; most had profound abnormalities of emotional processing and personality, and met criteria for "acquired sociopathy." By contrast, the left-sided participants had normal social and interpersonal behavior; they had stable employment; they performed normally and had normal skin conductance responses on the Gambling Task; they had normal emotional processing; and their personalities were unchanged from premorbid status. The marked deficits in social conduct, decision-making, and emotional processing in participants with unilateral right VMPC lesions are reminiscent in kind of those that have been reported in connection with bilateral VMPC lesions, albeit perhaps of lesser severity. The findings provide preliminary evidence that insofar as social, decision-making, and emotional functions are concerned, the right-sided component of the VMPC system may be critical, whereas the left-sided component may be less important.

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Author information

Author/s: Tranel, Daniel (D); Bechara, Antoine (A); Denburg, Natalie L (NL);

Affiliation: Department of Neurology, Division of Cognitive Neuroscience, University of Iowa College of Medicine, Iowa City 52242, USA. daniel-tranel(-atsign-)uiowa.edu

Grants: NS19632 (Agency:NINDS NIH HHS)

Journal and publication information

Publication Type: Comparative Study; Journal Article; Research Support, U.S. Gov't, P.H.S.

Journal: Cortex; a journal devoted to the study of the nervous system and behavior (Cortex), published in Italy. (Language: eng)

Reference: 2002-Sep; vol 38 (issue 4) : pp 589-612

Dates: Created 2002/12/05; Completed 2003/02/12; Revised 2007/11/14;

PMID: 12465670, status: MEDLINE (last retrieval date: 12/26/2008)

Sourced from the National Library of Medicine. Abstract text and other information may be subject to copyright.

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MeSH headings (categories)

This article was linked to the MESH Headings shown below.

Adult
Aged
Brain Mapping
Decision Making
Dominance, Cerebral - physiology
Emotions
Employment
Female
Humans

Male
Middle Aged
Neuropsychological Tests
Personality Assessment
Prefrontal Cortex - pathology; physiopathology; radiography
Psychiatric Status Rating Scales
Psychomotor Performance - physiology
Social Behavior
Tomography, X-Ray Computed - methods

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