The Riddle of Frontal Lobe Function in Man

This paper records a recurrent perplexity and a recent attempt at its resolution. Let me begin with the perplexity. Man_s frontal lobes have always presented problems that seemed to exceed those encountered in studying other regions of his brain. In striving to give a functional interpretation of anatomic pattern, we have therefore tended, in our laboratory, to begin by considering the occipital lobes and their processing of visual information (Teuber and Bender 1949; Teuber et al. 1960), and to progress from there to analysis of parietal and temporal lobe syndromes involving touch and hearing and higher processes (Teuber et al. 1951; Semmes et al. 1960). In this way, one can spend one’s life as an investigator without ever crossing the central fissure. And well one might—because it appears that by starting at the posterior end of the brain, it may become impossible in principle to reach the frontal lobes. I now believe that analysis of frontal lobe functions requires that we begin from that end, considering how these anterior parts act upon posterior, and predominantly sensory structures. What is needed is a 180° turn (Teuber 1961b). It is hardly an accident that the frontal lobes have continued to pose such insuperable difficulties to interpretations in traditional stimulus-response terms. Such conventional attacks on the problem go from sensory to motor functions; if the opposite approach is required—going from motor to sensory, as we shall suggest—then it may become understandable why frontal symptoms have been so perplexing.