The Roles of the Temporal and Frontal Lobes on Behavior

The cerebral cortex when further subdivided results in smaller parts otherwise known as the lobes. These lobes are defined by sizes of the fissures in respect to cerebrum. Others can be perceived as different and separate due to differences in their functions. Two of these lobes are the frontal lobes and the temporal lobes (Coon & Coon, 2005). Each of these lobes has different roles on behavior. These behaviors are also affected differently hereditary characteristics. Damage to these lobes is associated with severe behavior changes or damage.

Temporal lobes are found on each side of the brain. Usually the auditory signals pass directly to this lobes, this means therefore that hearing is registered here (Coon & Coon, 2005). Temporal lobe contributes to positive identification and understanding of words. It helps organizes and interprets somatic auditory as well as visual information (Moini, 2013). Some of these behaviors, such as ability to understand things, are much dependent on brain development. However brain development tends to follow relative fixed sequences of growth and changes in biology (Semrud-Clikeman & Ellison, 2009).

Damaging the temporal lobe affects temporal association are known as Wernicke’s area situated on the left temporal lobe. This are functions as a language site, and thus damage leads to receptive aphasia also known as fluent aphasia.The behaviors noticed in a person with damaged Wernicke’s area are; a person can hear but can experience difficulty in understanding the meaning of the words (Coon, Mitterer, Talbot & Vanchella, 2008).

Frontal lobe, as the name suggest is located on front side of the human mind, right after the parietal lobe and elongates forwards, occupying the entire front side. This lobe is associated with higher mental abilities, and is responsible for movement control. Primary motor cortex, tissue at the frontal lobe is directly responsible for body’s muscles. In this respect, since persons hands are more affected by the cortex, someone’s hands are usually found to be more skilled and agile than the legs (Coon, Mitterer, Talbot & Vanchella, 2008). Motor cortex also contains mirror neurons which become active when someone performs an action or when someone sees the action performed by someone else. Increased activity in the frontal lobe is directly related to what is usually termed as intelligence (Coon & Coon, 2005). On hereditary effect on development of intelligence in a person, Kamphaus (2005) explains that there is a strong correlation between biological parents and offspring’s. Other that the basic functions that affect behaviors, frontal lobe is also associated with complex behaviors. Other parts of the frontal lobe are known as the frontal association areas. They are usually responsible for controlling the body or receiving information from it as well as combining and processing the information. This affects a person’s ability to see and recognize things as well as naming them properly. The frontal lobe also is associated with mental ability such as language (Coon, Mitterer, Talbot & Vanchella, 2008).

Damaging a person’s frontal lobe leads to drastic changes in behavior. It affects a person’s personality and emotional life. A person’s ability to reason is also affected. Some of the behavior changes that can ne notice include  getting stuck on mental task  and repeating the same wrong answer a couple of times , a sign that reasoning is impaired (Coon & Coon, 2005). Coon, Mitterer, Talbot & Vanchella (2008) argues that when a person’s left hemisphere is damaged they suffer from aphasia which is an impaired ability to effectively use language. One particular example of aphasia is that Broca area, which is a center of speech. Damaging this area usually causes motor aphasia otherwise known as expressive aphasia and the effect of this on a person is difficulty in speaking or writing. Commonly noticed behavior is that a person might know what they want but fail to fluently utter the words. Goldberg (2002) argues that indeed frontal damage is closely related to criminality, through the relationship is intriguing and complex. However, Goldberg believes that since frontal lobe damage causes several impairment such as insight, impulse control the possibility of this leading to socially unaccepted behavior is high.

Get Your Custom Paper From Professional Writers. 100% Plagiarism Free, No AI Generated Content and Good Grade Guarantee. We Have Experts In All Subjects.

Place Your Order Now
Scroll to Top