Common Regions of the Human Frontal Lobe Recruited by

Diverse Cognitive DemandsJohn Duncan and Adrian M. Owen

Frontal Lobe

• Connectivity– Modules?

• Frontal functions

• Network of prefrontal regions involved in diverse cognitive tasks

Cognitive Demands

• Response conflict

• Novelty

• Working memory: number of elements

• Working memory: delay

• Perceptual difficulty

Isolation of a Cental Bottleneck of Information Processing with

Time-Resolved fMRIPaul E. Dux, Jason Ivanoff,

Christopher L. Asplund, and René Marois

Central Bottleneck

• Central, amodal processing stage

• Psychological refractory period

• Time-resolved fMRI

pLPFC

• Coactivation by contrasting tasks

• Serial postponement of activity

Implications

• SMFC as well as pLPFC

• Correspond to mid-dorsolateral and anterior cingulate– Recall Duncan & Owen (2000)

• Diverse cognitive functions, but limitations

An Integrative Theory of Prefrontal Cortex Function

Earl K. Miller and Jonathan D. Cohen

PFC

• Top-down control– Access to range of information – Multimodal– Maintain and update representations – Exert biasing signals to other regions– Plasticity