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Week 007 the Brain Hemispheres

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14 views

Week 007 the Brain Hemispheres

Uploaded by

wellplayedbuff
Copyright
© © All Rights Reserved
We take content rights seriously. If you suspect this is your content, claim it here.
Available Formats
Download as PDF, TXT or read online on Scribd
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The Brain:

Hemispheres
Introduction to Cognitive Science
“Left-Brained” People vs
“Right-Brained” People
Left-Brained Right-Brained
Analytical Synthesizing
Rational Intuitive
Linear / sequential Simultaneous
Detailed Holistic / whole
picture
Rules Associations
‘Sciency’ ‘Artsy’

How much of this is true?


The Two Hemispheres
Right Hemisphere

The hemispheres
Left Hemisphere Communicate via
the Corpus Callosum
People use both hemispheres
Lateralization
• When a certain cognitive function is processed
in one of the hemispheres, as opposed to the
other, then that cognitive function is lateralized.
• A clear example of laterilization:
– Left brain takes care of sensory-motor functions of
right half of body
– Right brain takes care of sensory-motor functions of
left half of body
• Does left-handedness vs right-handedness
correlate with ‘right-brained’ vs ‘left-brained’?
• What about eye dominance?
• Any other clear lateralization?
Language
Wernicke’s Area:
Speech Understanding

Broca’s Area:
Speech Production

In 95% of right-handed people,


the language is predominantly
processed on the left

In 20% of left-handed people,


It’s on the right, and for another
20% it’s bilateral
(so for most, it’s still on the left)
Detailed vs Holistic Processing
• The left hemisphere seems to
process information with an
eye for detail
• The right hemisphere seems to
process information with an
eye for the bigger picture

• Navigation: People with right-brain damage have to


navigate their environment with explicit ‘scripts’ based on
detailed landmarks.
• Face recognition: People with damaged right brain have
to ‘piece together’ who is in front of them based on facial
features.
• Right brain has more white matter, as axons of neurons
are longer in right brain
The ‘Rational’ Left vs
the ‘Impulsive’/’Intuitive’ Right
• Much of what the right brain is doing is unconscious (or
at least difficult to express in words: connection between
consciousness and language?). As such, decisions or
judgments made by the right brain are the kind of
decisions we often call ‘hunches’ or ‘impulses’.
• On the other hand, the decisions made by the left brain
are the kind of planned out, consciously deliberated (or
at least, expressed in words), decisions.
• Note the immediate stygma we attach to both kinds of
decisions: Rational = good (objective), Impulsive = bad
(subjective)
– But there are many cases where ‘impulsive’ decisions are
actually perfectly good decisions (‘Blink’ is a nice popular-
science book on this)
– And many cases where ‘reasoned out’ decisions are bad ones ->
‘rationalization’
The Two Hemispheres as a Team
• The resulting picture thus seems to be that
while there is no clear lateralization of
cognitive functions, the two hemispheres
do seem to have subtle differences in their
‘style’ of processing.
• Indeed, it is probably often by pooling
together the strengths/findings of the two
hemispheres that we accomplish cognitive
tasks.
When the Team Members get
Separated: Split-Brain Patients
• In split-brain patients, the two hemispheres are not
communicating (often because the corpus callossum, for
medical reasons, has been surgically severed)
• A typical split-brain patient can verbally report what is in
their right visual field (-> left brain -> language), but not
what is in their left visual field.
• Still, information from the left visual field can be
processed:
– Experiment: A split-brain patient was shown picture of a spoon in
left visual field. When asked what she saw, patient said
“Nothing”. Patient then had to reach with left hand behind a
curtain, and pick one of the objects there: book, pen, spoon, etc.
Patient picked the spoon. When asked what she had in her
hand, she said “pencil”
Another Split-Brain Experiment
Subjects are asked to point to what
they are seeing.
Left hand points to shovel, right to chicken
Explanation: Snowy scene in left visual
field is registered by right hemisphere,
which controls left hand, and vice versa

Subjects are then asked to explain why


they made that choice
They say: Well, I see a chicken foot, so
I point to the chicken, and the chicken
poop needs to be shoveled!
Explanation: with language in left
hemisphere, they can only report on
what’s on the right. And while the shovel
initially doesn’t fit in, the patient quickly
comes up with a story, i.e. rationalizes, why
Video he picked the shovel.
Split Brain -> Two Minds?
Two Personalities?

One side of face mirrored Other side of face mirrored

Atheist or Believer?
Alien Hands: Another case of
Non-Communication
• Some people suffer from alien hands
(often the left one: ‘sinistra’ = left): it does
things without them being in control of
what it does.
• In fact, the alien hands often negates what
the other hand just did (e.g. left hand will
unbutton the shirt that the right hand just
buttoned) as if it is the expression of some
‘evil twin’ inside them.
• Is this why most people are right-handed?
• Is this why ‘right’ also means ‘correct’?

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