Basic Forebrain

Psych 202

January 10, 2013

Forebrain, Telencephalon

Lobes of the Brain (continued)

• Temporal lobe

• Primary Auditory Cortex: receives auditory input
• Auditory association cortex: analyzes auditory information
• Auditory perceptions

• Occipital Lobe

• Primary Visual Cortex (PVC): Recieves input from the contralateral side of the visual field
• Visual Association Cortex: Surrounds PVC and extends into the ventral temporal lobe.

• Analyzes visual information
• Visual perception and memory storage

• Primary cortex is the closest to the outside

Halves of the Cortex

• Left: Sequential processing, language production, language comprehension

• Anything that has to happen in order (ex: remembering a phone number)

• Right: Global processing, nonverbal stimuli, spatial processing, navigation, facial recognition, emotion

• Things that do not have to happen in a sequential order. (ex: looking at a giant mural, you can look at any part of the mural to take it in)
• Ex: looking at a map
• Body language happens here

Cortical Connections

• Corpus Callosum: Thick axon bundle connecting corresponding regions of each hemisphere
• Coordinates sensory processing and motor output between the hemisphere
• Split-brain patient: Not having a corpus callosum or is sliced in half. Used to treat severe epilepsy.

Subcortical Brain

Limbic System

• Located within the telencephalon, surrounded by cerebral cortex
• Amygdala: controls emotion
• Hippocampus, fornix, mammillary bodies: Learning and memory
• Nucleus accumbens: Reinforcement
• Cingulate cortex/gyrus: Attention
• Olfactory bulb: Sense of smell

Basal Ganglia

• Involved in motivation and generation of movement
• Striatum: Caudate nucleus,