Research article summary (published 15 Jun 2009):

Lateral inferior prefrontal cortex and anterior cingulate cortex are engaged at different stages in the solution of insight problems.

Full Abstract

Two studies used puzzles that required participants to find a word that satisfied a set of constraints. The first study used a remote-association task, where participants had to find a word that would form compound words with 3 other words. The second study required participants to complete a word fragment with an associate of another word. Both studies produced distinct patterns of activity in the lateral inferior prefrontal cortex (LIPFC) and the anterior cingulate cortex (ACC). Activation in the LIPFC rose only as long as the participants were trying to retrieve the solution and dropped off as soon as the solution was obtained. However, activation in the ACC increased upon the retrieval of a solution, reflecting the need to process that solution. The data of the second experiment are fit by an information-processing model that interprets the activity in the LIPFC as reflecting retrieval operations and the activity in the ACC as reflecting subgoal setting.

Author information

Author/s: Anderson, John R (JR); Anderson, John F (JF); Ferris, Jennifer L (JL); Fincham, Jon M (JM); Jung, Kwan-Jin (KJ);

Affiliation: Department of Psychology, Carnegie Mellon University, Pittsburgh, PA 15213, USA. ja(-atsign-)cmu.edu

Journal and publication information

Publication Type: Journal Article; Randomized Controlled Trial; Research Support, Non-U.S. Gov't

Journal: Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America (Proc Natl Acad Sci U S A), published in United States. (Language: eng)

Reference: 2009-Jun; vol 106 (issue 26) : pp 10799-804

Dates: Created 2009/07/01; Completed 2009/09/28;

PMID: 19541657, status: MEDLINE (last retrieved date: 9/28/2009)

Sourced from the National Library of Medicine. Abstract text and other information may be subject to copyright.

External Links for this article
(including full text providers, if available):

Click Electronic Full-text Provider Links to see options for finding the electronic full text links to this article. Note there may be a subscription or fee required for access to the full text. See our FAQ for information on finding FREE full text articles.

This article may also be located in paper journal collections available in many libraries. Use the Journal and Publication Information above to find the full article.

MeSH headings (categories)

This article was linked to the MeSH Headings (categories) shown below.

Adolescent Adult Female Functional Laterality - physiology Gyrus Cinguli - physiology Humans Male

Prefrontal Cortex - physiology Psychomotor Performance - physiology Reaction Time - physiology Semantics Task Performance and Analysis Word Association Tests Young Adult

Note: Bold headings indicate primary MeSH headings or qualifiers.

Related articles

These are the most related articles currently in our database:

• Anterior cingulate cortex signals the requirement to break inertia when switching tasks: a study of the bivalency effect. 8 Jan 2008
• Task difficulty in a simultaneous face matching task modulates activity in face fusiform area. 29 Nov 2005
• Frontopolar cortex mediates abstract integration in analogy. 3 Jun 2006
• Brain regions underlying response inhibition and interference monitoring and suppression. 27 Feb 2006
• Cingulate cortex activation and competing responses: the role of preparedness for competition. 6 Sep 2005
• Working memory for location and time: activity in prefrontal area 46 relates to selection rather than maintenance in memory. 29 Jun 2001
• Social contracts and precautions activate different neurological systems: an fMRI investigation of deontic reasoning. 29 Jun 2005
• Neural changes in control implementation of a continuous task. 12 Mar 2007
• Frontal and posterior sources of event-related potentials in semantic comprehension. 30 Jul 2004
• Dissociating the roles of the rostral anterior cingulate and the lateral prefrontal cortices in performing two tasks simultaneously or successively. 30 Mar 2003

See 100+ related articles.

Related Article Map

Legend: - FREE Full text Article. - Abstract only. - Title only. More help.

See a larger map of 100+ related articles.