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Brain Advance Access published online on November 10, 2009
Brain, doi:10.1093/brain/awp269
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© The Author(s) 2009. Published by Oxford University Press on behalf of Brain.
This is an Open Access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution Non-Commercial License (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/2.5/uk/) which permits unrestricted non-commercial use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited.

Executive function and fluid intelligence after frontal lobe lesions

María Roca1,2, Alice Parr3, Russell Thompson3, Alexandra Woolgar3, Teresa Torralva1,2, Nagui Antoun4, Facundo Manes1,2 and John Duncan3

1 Institute of Cognitive Neurology (INECO), Buenos Aires, Argentina 2 Institute of Neurosciences, Favaloro University, Buenos Aires, Argentina 3 MRC Cognition and Brain Sciences Unit, 15 Chaucer Road, Cambridge CB2 7EF, UK 4 Department of Radiology, Addenbrooke's Hospital, Hills Road, Cambridge, UK

Correspondence to: John Duncan, MRC Cognition and Brain Sciences Unit, 15 Chaucer Road, Cambridge CB2 7EF, UK E-mail: john.duncan{at}mrc-cbu.cam.ac.uk

Many tests of specific ‘executive functions’ show deficits after frontal lobe lesions. These deficits appear on a background of reduced fluid intelligence, best measured with tests of novel problem solving. For a range of specific executive tests, we ask how far frontal deficits can be explained by a general fluid intelligence loss. For some widely used tests, e.g. Wisconsin Card Sorting, we find that fluid intelligence entirely explains frontal deficits. When patients and controls are matched on fluid intelligence, no further frontal deficit remains. For these tasks too, deficits are unrelated to lesion location within the frontal lobe. A second group of tasks, including tests of both cognitive (e.g. Hotel, Proverbs) and social (Faux Pas) function, shows a different pattern. Deficits are not fully explained by fluid intelligence and the data suggest association with lesions in the right anterior frontal cortex. Understanding of frontal lobe deficits may be clarified by separating reduced fluid intelligence, important in most or all tasks, from other more specific impairments and their associated regions of damage.

Key Words: executive function; fluid intelligence; frontal lobe

Abbreviations: IQ, intelligence quotient

Received January 27, 2009. Revised August 24, 2009. Accepted September 2, 2009.


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