What impairments would you expect to see following damage to the ventromedial prefrontal cortex? Compare and contrast with lesions affecting the dorsolateral prefontal cortex. In 1948, Phineas Gage, an American railroad construction foreman, was involved in a terrible accident in which a tamping iron was pushed explosively upward through his left cheek and came out from the top of his head (Harlow, 1948). He stunned his colleagues by not only surviving the event and quickly regaining consciousness, but also by making his way to a nearby cart. Gage regained many of his physical and mental abilities, but his personality remained altered to the point that he was considered "rude, profane, crude, and vulgar" (Bigelow, 1851), having previously been considered diligent and pleasant . The curious case of this man suffering from extensive brain damage but nevertheless having retained many functions has fueled interest and research into the localization of functions in the brain. Although the exact nature of Gage's injuries has been the subject of much debate (Ratiu et al., 2004), it is generally accepted that much of his left prefrontal cortex was damaged, including the orbito- medial and lateral frontal and the dorsolateral prefrontal. Stuss and colleagues (2002) argue that clinical neuropsychology in its simplest form is "the understanding of the links between the brain and behavior and their applications to clinical situations." In their review of the history of clinical neuropsychology, they discuss three areas that have contributed to our current understanding of the links between brain behavior, including 1) behavioral neurology, 2) neuropsychiatry, and 3) clinical neuropsychology. Within these disciplines, a range of techniques are used to study the location...... middle of paper ...... superior temporal cortex during word generation. However, dlPFC changes are not observed during tasks when they are required to make lexical decisions regarding word listening, suggesting that the dlPFC plays a role in modulating word generation (Frith et al., 1991). In a study of the effects of anterior and posterior focal regions of the brain on verbal fluency, Stuss and colleagues (1998) suggest that although deficits are seen with superior medial frontal lesions, those with left dlPFC, striatal lesions and left parietals are more literally altered. -mastery based on. Patients with right dlPFC lesions do not show deficits in this task. The same lesions also produced categorical fluency deficits, as did damage to the right dlPFC. They are that the specific role of the dlPFC in these tasks is initiation and activation, verbal articulatory repetition and sustained production..