Broad domain generality in focal regions of frontal and parietal cortex

• DOI: 10.1073/pnas.1315235110
• Publication Date: 2013-09-24T05:25:39Z
• Authors: Evelina Fedorenko; John Duncan; Nancy Kanwisher
• Keywords: Generality; Human brain; Neurophysiology

Significance One of the oldest debates in cognitive neuroscience concerns degree functional specialization present human brain. Prior work has discovered several highly specialized components dedicated to particular mental functions, like face recognition or motion perception. However, our versatility suggests additional existence more general-purpose machinery. Building on prior neuroimaging evidence, along with neurophysiological evidence from non-human primates, we searched for such domain-general brain regions humans. Seven diverse demanding tasks produced overlapping activation at individual-subject level a number frontal and parietal regions. Thus, cognition arises hardware that includes not only components, but also very ones plausibly enable us solve novel problems.