The unity and diversity of executive functions and their contributions to complex "Frontal Lobe" tasks: a latent variable analysis.

▪ Abstract The prefrontal cortex has long been suspected to play an important role in cognitive control, in the ability to orchestrate thought and action in accordance with internal goals. Its neural basis, however, has remained a mystery. Here, we propose that cognitive control stems from the active maintenance of patterns of activity in the prefrontal cortex that represent goals and the means to achieve them. They provide bias signals to other brain structures whose net effect is to guide the flow of activity along neural pathways that establish the proper mappings between inputs, internal states, and outputs needed to perform a given task. We review neurophysiological, neurobiological, neuroimaging, and computational studies that support this theory and discuss its implications as well as further issues to be addressed

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An integrative theory of prefrontal cortex function

Publisher Summary This chapter focuses on the modern notion of short-term memory, called working memory. Working memory refers to the temporary maintenance of information that was just experienced or just retrieved from long-term memory but no longer exists in the external environment. These internal representations are short-lived, but can be maintained for longer periods of time through active rehearsal strategies, and can be subjected to various operations that manipulate the information in such a way that makes it useful for goal-directed behavior. Working memory is a system that is critically important in cognition and seems necessary in the course of performing many other cognitive functions, such as reasoning, language comprehension, planning, and spatial processing. This chapter demonstrates the functional importance of dopamine to working memory function in several ways. Elucidation of the cognitive and neural mechanisms underlying human working memory is an important focus of cognitive neuroscience and neurology for much of the past decade. One conclusion that arises from research is that working memory, a faculty that enables temporary storage and manipulation of information in the service of behavioral goals, can be viewed as neither a unitary, nor a dedicated system. Data from numerous neuropsychological and neurophysiological studies in animals and humans demonstrates that a network of brain regions, including the prefrontal cortex, is critical for the active maintenance of internal representations.

Chapter 11 Working memory

Co-Planar Stereotaxic Atlas of the Human Brain—3-Dimensional Proportional System: An Approach to Cerebral Imaging, J. Talairach, P. Tournoux. Georg Thieme Verlag, New York (1988), 122 pp., 130 figs. DM 268

Attention and Effort

Cognitive Performance during Anesthesia

The effect of potentially distracting processing within working memory was examined by varying the nature and position of processing across conditions of a Brown-Peterson-like task. Separate groups of participants carried out verbal or visuospatial processing operations on identical stimuli, while retaining lists of to-be-remembered words. The number of words presented either before or after the processing interval was varied systematically. Results showed that although verbal processing was no more demanding than visuospatial processing, it led to greater forgetting. However, forgetting was confined to items presented prior to processing, and the difference in degree of forgetting shown by the two groups was maximal when four items occurred before processing. Temporal isolation effects were more marked in the verbal processing group. These findings indicate that individuals can keep active a limited number of items in primary memory during processing, unless processing blocks rehearsal, in which case retrieval occurs from secondary memory.

/pdf/the-nature-and-position-of-processing-determines-why-2oulsehevx.pdf

The nature and position of processing determines why forgetting occurs in working memory tasks

Why are amnesic judgements of recency and frequency made in a qualitatively different way from those of normal people

Subjects were asked to solve a series of 12 anagram problems. For each of these they were allowed 1 min. and if they did not solve it in this time they were told the solution. When asked to recall ...

A zeigarnik-like effect in the recall of anagram solutions

Contents Preface Further Reading Leeds 1934-53 Chapter 1 - Growing up in Yorkshire London 1953-56 Chapter 2 - Psychology in the 1950s: Seeds of the Cognitive Revolution Princeton - Los Angeles 1956-77 Chapter 3 - The Trip of a Lifetime Leeds and Bristol 1957-58 Chapter 4 - In Search of a Job Cambridge 1958-67 Chapter 5 - From Cognitive Science to Applied Psychology Chapter 6 - Psychology Under Water Chapter 7 - Practical Applications and Theoretical Implications: Postmen and Watchkeepers Chapter 8 - Acoustic and Semantic codes: Evidence for Separate Memory Systems? Sussex 1967-72 Chapter 9 - From Full-time Research to a New University Chapter 10 -Amnesia San Diego 1970-71 Chapter 11 - California and New Directions in Memory Research Chapter 12 - The Emergence of Semantic Memory Returning to Sussex 1971-72 Chapter 13 - Working Memory and the Phonological Loop Stirling 1972-74 Chapter 14 - Working Memory and Visual Imagery Cambridge 1974-95 Chapter 15 - Returning to the Unit Chapter 16 - Encounters with the Law Chapter 17 - Stress: From Sky Diving to Anaesthetics Chapter 18 - When Long-term Memory Fails Chapter 19 - Working Memory and Language Chapter 20 - Boston and the Central Executive Chapter 21 - Psychology Around the World Bristol 1995-2003 Chapter 22 -The Episodic Buffer Chapter 23 - Patients, Parasites and Mobile Phones Stanford 2001-02 Chapter 24 - Working Memory in Context: Neuroscience, Emotion and Philosophy Returning to Yorkshire 2003 - Chapter 25 - Exploring the Episodic Buffer Chapter 26 - Summing up: From Behaviourism to Cognitive Neuroscience

Alan D. Baddeley

Papers

Cognitive Performance during Anesthesia

The nature and position of processing determines why forgetting occurs in working memory tasks

Why are amnesic judgements of recency and frequency made in a qualitatively different way from those of normal people

A zeigarnik-like effect in the recall of anagram solutions

Working Memories: Postmen, Divers and the Cognitive Revolution