Cortex RSS feed: Current Issue. CORTEX is an international journal devoted to the study of cognition and of the relationship between the nervous system and mental processes, particularly as these are reflected in the behaviour of patients with acquired brain lesions, normal volunteers, children with typical and atypical development, and in the activation of brain regions and systems as recorded by functional neuroimaging techniques. It was founded in 1964 by Ennio De Renzi. http://www.cortexjournal.net/?rss=yesElsevier Inc.en © 2012 Published by Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved. Cortex0010-9452486June 2012 © 2012 Published by Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved. healthpermissions@elsevier.comhttp://www.cortexjournal.net/article/PIIS0010945212001128/abstract?rss=yesCover Figure10.1016/S0010-9452(12)00112-8Cortex 48, 6 (2012)2012-06-01Cortex2012-06-01486S0010-9452(12)X0005-4e1e1http://www.cortexjournal.net/article/PIIS001094521200113X/abstract?rss=yesEditorial Board/Title Page10.1016/S0010-9452(12)00113-XCortex 48, 6 (2012)2012-06-01Cortex2012-06-01486S0010-9452(12)X0005-4iihttp://www.cortexjournal.net/article/PIIS0010945212001311/abstract?rss=yesContents10.1016/S0010-9452(12)00131-1Cortex 48, 6 (2012)2012-06-01Cortex2012-06-01486S0010-9452(12)X0005-4iiiivhttp://www.cortexjournal.net/article/PIIS0010945211002358/abstract?rss=yesThe invention of the electric battery, communicated to the Royal Society of London by Alessandro Volta (1745–1827) on 20th March 1800, had a tremendous historical impact in putting electricity at the centre stage of nineteenth century science and society. Volta’s invention had been stimulated by previous research on animal electricity performed by Luigi Galvani (1737–1798) in Bologna, in the second half of the eighteenth century. It had been inspired particularly by a reflection on the structure of the electric organ of some fishes, like the torpedo and the eel of Guyana, which accounts for the phrase organe électrique artificiel first used by Volta to describe his invention (see ).Carlo Matteucci (1811–1868), the “frogs pile”, and the Risorgimento of electrophysiologyMarco Piccolino, Nicholas J. Wade10.1016/j.cortex.2011.08.002Cortex 48, 6 (2012)2011-09-19Cortex2011-09-19486S0010-9452(12)X0005-4Cover Illustration645646http://www.cortexjournal.net/article/PIIS0010945212001025/abstract?rss=yesA number of factors may influence citation rates of journal papers, several of which have little to do with the quality of those papers. These include author(s) reputation (), whether the journal is open-access (), whether there is a major paper in the same journal issue (), and the number of self-citations ().Are higher cited papers accepted faster for publication?Jennifer A. Foley, Laura Valkonen10.1016/j.cortex.2012.03.018Cortex 48, 6 (2012)2012-04-16Cortex2012-04-16486S0010-9452(12)X0005-4Editorial647653http://www.cortexjournal.net/article/PIIS0010945211000232/abstract?rss=yesAbstract: Unilateral spatial neglect is a disabling condition, frequently observed after right-hemisphere damage (RHD), and associated with poor functional recovery. Clinical and experimental evidence indicates that attentional impairments are prominent in neglect. Recent brain imaging and behavioral studies in neglect patients and healthy individuals have provided insights into the mechanisms of attention and have revealed interactions between putative attentional networks. We recruited 16 RHD patients and 16 neurologically intact observers to perform a lateralized version of the Attention Network Test devised by Posner and co-workers (). The results showed evidence of interaction between attentional networks during conflict resolution. Phasic alertness improved the orienting deficit to left-sided targets, reducing the interference of distracters in the neglected visual field, thus facilitating conflict resolution in the majority of patients. Modulating alertness may be an important way of improving basic deficits associated with neglect, such as those affecting spatial orienting.Attention networks and their interactions after right-hemisphere damageAna B. Chica, Michel Thiebaut de Schotten, Monica Toba, Paresh Malhotra, Juan Lupiáñez, Paolo Bartolomeo10.1016/j.cortex.2011.01.009Cortex 48, 6 (2012)2011-03-08Cortex2011-03-08486S0010-9452(12)X0005-4Research Reports654663http://www.cortexjournal.net/article/PIIS0010945211000384/abstract?rss=yesAbstract: Introduction: Recent functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) evidence shows differential involvement of the inferior frontal gyrus (IFG) and the ventral premotor cortex (PMv) in syntactic processing. Our main goal is to specify the precise role of the PMv in the processing of sequential structures and whether these processes are a necessary prerequisite for the successful acquisition of grammatical structure.Methods: We tested patients with PMv lesions in an artificial grammar (AG) learning task, including correct sentences and sentences with violations of local (referring to adjacent elements within an AG string) and long-distance dependencies (incorporating recursive structures). In addition to performance measures event-related potentials to these violations were recorded.Results and conclusions: Compared to matched controls, patients displayed impaired acquisition of the AG. This impairment was more pronounced for local than for long-distance dependencies. This effect was paralleled by a selective reduction of the P600 component in response to violations of local dependencies. Most importantly, the P600 elicited by violations of long-distance dependencies was comparable between groups. Together, behavioral and ERP results indicate a PMv involvement in processing local sequential information.Ventral premotor cortex lesions disrupt learning of sequential grammatical structuresBertram Opitz, Sonja A. Kotz10.1016/j.cortex.2011.02.013Cortex 48, 6 (2012)2011-03-21Cortex2011-03-21486S0010-9452(12)X0005-4Research Reports664673http://www.cortexjournal.net/article/PIIS0010945211000633/abstract?rss=yesAbstract: Introduction: Changes in personality differ qualitatively and quantitatively among patients with different neurodegenerative diseases, likely due to divergent patterns of regional neurodegeneration. Regional damage to circuits underlying various cognitive and emotional functions have been associated with interpersonal traits like dominance, extraversion, and warmth in patients with neurodegenerative diseases, suggesting that personality may in part be mediated by these more basic neuropsychological functions. In this study, we hypothesized that different combinations of cognitive, neuropsychiatric, and emotional measures would predict different interpersonal traits in patients with neurodegenerative diseases.Methods: A battery of cognitive, neuropsychiatric, and emotional measures was administered to 286 patients with various neurodegenerative diseases such as Alzheimer’s disease, behavioral variant frontotemporal dementia, semantic dementia, and progressive supranuclear palsy, and informants described patients’ dominance, extraversion, and warmth using the Interpersonal Adjective Scales (IAS) personality questionnaire. Regression modeling was performed to identify which neuropsychological factors uniquely predicted current personality, controlling for age, gender, and premorbid personality.Results: Social dominance covaried with patients’ capacity for cognitive control and verbal fluency. Conversely, warmth did not rely on these executive or verbal skills, but covaried primarily with patients’ capacity for emotional responsiveness. Extraversion, representing a blend of dominance and warmth, demonstrated an intermediate degree of relationship to both executive/verbal and emotional functions.Conclusions: These findings suggest that different personality traits are partly subserved by specific cognitive and emotional functions in neurodegenerative disease patients. While this study was performed in the context of brain damage, the results raise the question of whether individual differences in these neuropsychological abilities may also underlie variability in normal personality.Neuropsychological correlates of dominance, warmth, and extraversion in neurodegenerative diseaseMarc Sollberger, Christine M. Stanley, Robin Ketelle, Victoria Beckman, Matthew Growdon, Jung Jang, John Neuhaus, Joel H. Kramer, Bruce L. Miller, Katherine P. Rankin10.1016/j.cortex.2011.03.001Cortex 48, 6 (2012)2011-04-07Cortex2011-04-07486S0010-9452(12)X0005-4Research Reports674682http://www.cortexjournal.net/article/PIIS001094521100058X/abstract?rss=yesAbstract: Here we describe the first documented case of congenital amusia in childhood. AS is a 10-year-old girl who was referred to us by her choir director for persisting difficulties in singing. We tested her with the child version of the Montreal Battery for the Evaluation of Amusia (MBEA) which confirmed AS’s severe problems with melodic and rhythmic discrimination and memory for melodies. The disorder appears to be limited to music since her audiometry as well as her intellectual and language skills are normal. Furthermore, the musical disorder is associated to a severe deficit in detecting small pitch changes. The electrical brain responses point to an anomaly in the early stages of auditory processing, such as reflected by an abnormal mismatch negativity (MMN) response to small pitch changes. In singing, AS makes more pitch than time errors. Thus, despite frequent and regular musical practice, AS’s profile is similar to the adult form of congenital amusia.Congenital amusia in childhood: A case studyMarie-Andrée Lebrun, Patricia Moreau, Andréane McNally-Gagnon, Geneviève Mignault Goulet, Isabelle Peretz10.1016/j.cortex.2011.02.018Cortex 48, 6 (2012)2011-03-31Cortex2011-03-31486S0010-9452(12)X0005-4Research Reports683688http://www.cortexjournal.net/article/PIIS0010945211000694/abstract?rss=yesAbstract: In the current study we examined the recognition of facial expressions embedded in emotionally expressive bodies in case LG, an individual with a rare form of developmental visual agnosia (DVA) who suffers from severe prosopagnosia. Neuropsychological testing demonstrated that LG’s agnosia is characterized by profoundly impaired visual integration. Unlike individuals with typical developmental prosopagnosia who display specific difficulties with face identity (but typically not expression) recognition, LG was also impaired at recognizing isolated facial expressions. By contrast, he successfully recognized the expressions portrayed by faceless emotional bodies handling affective paraphernalia. When presented with contextualized faces in emotional bodies his ability to detect the emotion expressed by a face did not improve even if it was embedded in an emotionally-congruent body context. Furthermore, in contrast to controls, LG displayed an abnormal pattern of contextual influence from emotionally-incongruent bodies. The results are interpreted in the context of a general integration deficit in DVA, suggesting that impaired integration may extend from the level of the face to the level of the full person.Impaired integration of emotional faces and affective body context in a rare case of developmental visual agnosiaHillel Aviezer, Ran R. Hassin, Shlomo Bentin10.1016/j.cortex.2011.03.005Cortex 48, 6 (2012)2011-04-13Cortex2011-04-13486S0010-9452(12)X0005-4Research Reports689700http://www.cortexjournal.net/article/PIIS0010945211000566/abstract?rss=yesAbstract: Illusory contour (IC) perception, a fruitful model for studying the automatic contextual integration of local image features, can be used to investigate the putative impairment of such integration in children with autism spectrum disorders (ASD). We used the illusory Kanizsa square to test how the phase-locked (PL) gamma and beta electroencephalogram (EEG) responses of typically developing (TD) children aged 3–7 years and those with ASD were modulated by the presence of IC in the image. The PL beta and gamma activity strongly differentiated between IC and control figures in both groups of children (IC effect). However, the timing, topography, and direction of the IC effect differed in TD and ASD children. Between 40msec and 120msec after stimulus onset, both groups demonstrated lower power of gamma oscillations at occipital areas in response to IC than in response to the control figure. In TD children, this relative gamma suppression was followed by relatively higher parieto-occipital gamma and beta responses to IC within 120–270msec after stimulus onset. This second stage of IC processing was absent in children with ASD. Instead, their response to IC was characterized by protracted (40–270msec) relative reduction of gamma and beta oscillations at occipital areas. We hypothesize that children with ASD rely more heavily on lower-order processing in the primary visual areas and have atypical later stage related to higher-order processes of contour integration.High-frequency oscillatory response to illusory contour in typically developing boys and boys with autism spectrum disordersTatiana A. Stroganova, Elena V. Orekhova, Andrey O. Prokofyev, Marina M. Tsetlin, Vitaliy V. Gratchev, Alexey A. Morozov, Yuriy V. Obukhov10.1016/j.cortex.2011.02.016Cortex 48, 6 (2012)2011-04-04Cortex2011-04-04486S0010-9452(12)X0005-4Research Reports701717http://www.cortexjournal.net/article/PIIS001094521100061X/abstract?rss=yesAbstract: The purpose of this study was to investigate the role of the cerebellum in the executive control of word generation using a phonemic and semantic fluency task. Phonemic fluency tasks require novel strategy to organize verbal output, and are more effortful than semantic fluency tasks. The number of category switches made between subcategories of words is a measure of mental flexibility, and is greatest during the early phase of the task (first 15sec). Both tasks were tested on healthy participants, before and after the application of transcranial magnetic stimulation using continuous theta burst stimulation (cTBS) applied over the left or the right posterior/lateral cerebellar cortex in separate groups. We hypothesized that the number of category switches and number of words produced within the first 15sec would be reduced after cTBS to the right, posterior-lateral cerebellum during phonemic fluency tasks. The results from the study were consistent with the hypothesis. Within the first 15sec of each trial, right cTBS participants displayed significantly lower switching scores (p=.05) after stimulation. Previous studies have illustrated similar impairments in switching between categories during phonemic fluency performance in patients with damage to the left frontal cortex. Our findings support the general hypothesis of cerebellar involvement in executive control through connections to the frontal cortex.The cerebellum and its role in word generation: A cTBS studyCarla P. Arasanz, W. Richard Staines, Eric A. Roy, Tom A. Schweizer10.1016/j.cortex.2011.02.021Cortex 48, 6 (2012)2011-04-04Cortex2011-04-04486S0010-9452(12)X0005-4Research Reports718724http://www.cortexjournal.net/article/PIIS001094521100030X/abstract?rss=yesAbstract: It is considered that whole-face processing of spatial structure may only be possible in upright faces, with only local feature processing in inverted faces. We asked whether this was due to impoverished representations of inverted faces. We performed two experiments. In the first, we divided faces into segments to create ‘exploded’ faces with disrupted second-order structures, and ‘scrambled’ faces with altered first-order relations; in the second we shifted features within intact facial outlines to create equivalent disruptions of spatial structure. In both we assessed the transfer of adaptation between faces with altered structure and intact faces. Scrambled adaptors did not adapt upright or inverted intact faces, indicating that a whole-face configuration is required at either orientation. Both upright and inverted faces showed a similar decline in aftereffect magnitude when adapting faces had altered second-order structure, implying that this structure is present in both upright and inverted face representations. We conclude that inverted faces are not represented simply as a collection of features, but have a whole-face configuration with second-order structure, similar to upright faces. Thus the qualitative impairments induced by inversion are not due to degraded inverted facial representations, but may reflect limitations in perceptual mechanisms.The nature of upright and inverted face representations: An adaptation-transfer study of configurationPaul Pichler, Maryam Dosani, Ipek Oruç, Jason J.S. Barton10.1016/j.cortex.2011.02.005Cortex 48, 6 (2012)2011-03-11Cortex2011-03-11486S0010-9452(12)X0005-4Research Reports725736http://www.cortexjournal.net/article/PIIS0010945211000669/abstract?rss=yesAbstract: Spatial relations are typically divided into categorical and coordinate spatial relations. Categorical relations are abstract and show a left hemisphere (LH) advantage, whereas coordinate relations are metric and related to a right hemisphere (RH) advantage. In the current study a working memory task was used to asses categorical and coordinate performance with two different stimulus sets. In this task, participants had to compare two sequentially presented stimuli, consisting of a dot and a cross. The cross size used in the stimuli was either large or small; a direct manipulation of the amount of information provided to determine a category, or to assess a distance. Patients with damage in the LH or the RH and highly comparable controls were tested. In control participants, categorical processing is faster with the use of a large cross, i.e., more visual information about category boundaries. In contrast, coordinate performance was more accurate with a small cross, i.e., presenting less unnecessary visual information. LH patients showed a specific defect in processing categorical stimuli with a small cross and coordinate stimuli with a large cross. The RH patients were impaired in all conditions except for the categorical small cross condition. We conclude that a larger amount of information present in stimuli increases categorical processing performance and decreases coordinate processing performance, while opposite effects are found for less stimulus information.The effect of stimulus features on working memory of categorical and coordinate spatial relations in patients with unilateral brain damageIneke J.M. van der Ham, Richard J.A. van Wezel, Anna Oleksiak, Martine J.E. van Zandvoort, Catharina J.M. Frijns, L. Jaap Kappelle, Albert Postma10.1016/j.cortex.2011.03.002Cortex 48, 6 (2012)2011-04-07Cortex2011-04-07486S0010-9452(12)X0005-4Research Reports737745http://www.cortexjournal.net/article/PIIS0010945211000281/abstract?rss=yesAbstract: Amputees who have a phantom limb often report the ability to move this phantom voluntarily. In the literature, phantom limb movements are generally considered to reflect motor imagery rather than motor execution. The aim of this study was to investigate whether amputees distinguish between executing a movement of the phantom limb and imagining moving the missing limb. We examined the capacity of 19 upper-limb amputees to execute and imagine movements of both their phantom and intact limbs. Their behaviour was compared with that of 18 age-matched normal controls. A global questionnaire-based assessment of imagery ability and timed tests showed that amputees can indeed distinguish between motor execution and motor imagery with the phantom limb, and that the former is associated with activity in stump muscles while the latter is not. Amputation reduced the speed of voluntary movements with the phantom limb but did not change the speed of imagined movements, suggesting that the absence of the limb specifically affects the ability to voluntarily move the phantom but does not change the ability to imagine moving the missing limb. These results suggest that under some conditions, for example amputation, the predicted sensory consequences of a motor command are sufficient to evoke the sensation of voluntary movement. They also suggest that the distinction between imagined and executed movements should be taken into consideration when designing research protocols to investigate the analgesic effects of sensorimotor feedback.The moving phantom: Motor execution or motor imagery?Estelle Raffin, Pascal Giraux, Karen T. Reilly10.1016/j.cortex.2011.02.003Cortex 48, 6 (2012)2011-03-14Cortex2011-03-14486S0010-9452(12)X0005-4Research Reports746757http://www.cortexjournal.net/article/PIIS0010945211002413/abstract?rss=yesAbstract: Somatoparaphrenia consists in abnormal or bizarre verbal reports about some parts of the body. Such a pathological condition usually lasts for days or weeks and is variably associated with other cognitive defects. In the present paper we describe exceptionally long-lasting somatoparaphrenia in two focal brain-damaged patients: GA who had a right hemorrhagic fronto-parieto-temporal stroke and AC who developed a left ischemic parieto-occipital lesion. The presence and severity of somatoparaphrenia did not change in either patient during a 2-year follow-up, whereas the two patients showed different evolution of anosognosia for motor disorders, severity of extrapersonal neglect and cognitive impairments. Moreover, impairment of position sense was associated with somatoparaphrenia in one patient only; neither patient showed personal neglect. The reported clinical observations suggest that somatoparaphrenia can be observed as a body-related chronic disorder and can outlast other cognitive defects, even if it arose in conjunction with them.Chronic somatoparaphrenia: A follow-up study on two clinical casesRossella Cogliano, Claudio Crisci, Massimiliano Conson, Dario Grossi, Luigi Trojano10.1016/j.cortex.2011.08.008Cortex 48, 6 (2012)2011-09-19Cortex2011-09-19486S0010-9452(12)X0005-4Notes758767http://www.cortexjournal.net/article/PIIS0010945211002474/abstract?rss=yesAbstract: The visual attention (VA) span deficit hypothesis of dyslexia posits that letter string deficits are a consequence of impaired visual processing. Alternatively, some have interpreted this deficit as resulting from a visual-to-phonology code mapping impairment. This study aims to disambiguate between the two interpretations by investigating performance in a non-verbal character string visual categorization task with verbal and non-verbal stimuli. Results show that VA span ability predicts performance for the non-verbal visual processing task in normal reading children. Furthermore, VA span impaired dyslexic children are also impaired for the categorization task independently of stimuli type. This supports the hypothesis that the underlying impairment responsible for the VA span deficit is visual, not verbal.The visual attention span deficit in dyslexia is visual and not verbalMuriel Lobier, Rachel Zoubrinetzky, Sylviane Valdois10.1016/j.cortex.2011.09.003Cortex 48, 6 (2012)2011-10-10Cortex2011-10-10486S0010-9452(12)X0005-4Notes768773http://www.cortexjournal.net/article/PIIS0010945211001419/abstract?rss=yesCharles Bonnet Syndrome (CBS) is a disorder characterized by complex visual hallucinations with insight, not accompanied by psychotic symptoms, usually observed in elderly patients with an acquired impairment of vision (). Different aetiologies were identified falling into two main categories both inducing vision impairment: eye disease () and cerebral disorders involving visual pathways ().Complex visual hallucinations after occipital extrastriate ischemic strokeM. Tombini, G. Pellegrino, F. Zappasodi, C.C. Quattrocchi, G. Assenza, J.M. Melgari, L. Parisi, F. Vernieri, P.M. Rossini10.1016/j.cortex.2011.04.027Cortex 48, 6 (2012)2011-05-30Cortex2011-05-30486S0010-9452(12)X0005-4Letter to the Editor774777http://www.cortexjournal.net/article/PIIS0010945211001080/abstract?rss=yesRehabilitation approaches based on the use of motor imagery (alone or combined with mirror/virtual visual feedback) are being increasingly used to treat chronic pain in different patient populations (). The type of motor imagery employed varies from one study to another. While some authors use implicit motor imagery tasks, for example judging the laterality of a hand or foot presented in a picture, others use explicit motor imagery performed without visual support, with or without controlling whether the subject contracts muscles during the tasks. And finally, in clinical studies some are using what can be termed “attempted movements” in which the subject is really trying to move his limb, although no movement occurs because of a complete paralysis or because of the absence of the limb. In the literature, the difference between explicit motor imagery and attempted movements is often not clear, especially when the muscle activity is not or cannot be recorded.Interactions between motor imagery and pain. Comment on Raffin et al. (2012)Catherine Mercier10.1016/j.cortex.2011.04.013Cortex 48, 6 (2012)2011-05-25Cortex2011-05-25486S0010-9452(12)X0005-4Commentary778780http://www.cortexjournal.net/article/PIIS0010945211002681/abstract?rss=yes“There is more to reality that meets a normal eye. Behind the curtain of everyday consciousness there is hidden another unutterably strange mental universe”. This is how a documentary of the British Broadcasting Corporation (BBC), titled “The Beyond Within”, started. The chemist Albert Hoffman describes how he felt, after having tested a small dosage of the powerful hallucinogen he discovered by accident, the lysergic acid (LSD). “A kind of dream world appeared” and normal reality seemed to disintegrate. Also our sober daily lives are inextricably intertwined with a sort of dream world, that might frequently appear to our mind’s eye. For most people, switching attention from the external environment (that reaches the “normal eye”) to a mental, internal universe is a common experience. Voluntarily or by accident, we can get lost behind the curtain of the eyes, daydreaming of a different, completely distorted, reality. That is, we can play with our mental images.Picture yourself in a boat on a riverwith tangerine trees and marmalade skies.Somebody calls you, you answer quite slowlya girl with kaleidoscope eyes.(“Lucy in the Sky with Diamonds”, Beatles, 1967)The beyond withinStefania de Vito10.1016/j.cortex.2011.09.008Cortex 48, 6 (2012)2011-10-26Cortex2011-10-26486S0010-9452(12)X0005-4Quotes and Titbits781784