[A historical view of behavioural alterations due to lesions in the prefrontal cortex: from Phineas Gage to Luria].
BACKGROUND
Over the last 200 years, a number of authors have considered the prefrontal cortex to be the 'organ of civilisation', that is, the most characteristically human part of the brain, while others have seen this region of the brain as playing a far less important role in behaviour.


OBJECTIVE
To examine the study of behavioural alterations caused by lesions in the prefrontal cortex from a historical perspective.


METHODS
Since the middle of the 19th century, reports have appeared in the scientific literature of patients with behavioural alterations caused by traumatic injuries to the prefrontal region or brain tumours located in this area of the brain. From the beginning of the 20th century onwards, most of the information for this field of study has been obtained from the results of treating brain tumours and psychiatric disorders by means of brain surgery. The observations that have been gathered over these two centuries have sparked a heated debate about the connection between behaviour and the prefrontal cortex.


CONCLUSIONS
The fact that behavioural disorders and prefrontal lesions are constantly associated to each other seems to confirm the existence of a relation between the two. In recent decades, several theoretical approaches have appeared that continue to see the prefrontal cortex as playing an important role in performing the mental processes involved in human behaviour, but also offer new points of view about the relation between behaviour and the brain. These new perspectives are based on the connections between the prefrontal cortex and other cortical and subcortical regions.
García-Molina
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Institut Universitari de Neurorehabilitació Guttmann-UAB, Badalona, España. agarciam.investigacio@guttmann.com
D001927:Brain Diseases / Q000150:complications / Q000266:history*; D049672:History, 19th Century; D049673:History, 20th Century; D006801:Humans; D001523:Mental Disorders / Q000209:etiology / Q000266:history*; D017397:Prefrontal Cortex