Performance Enhancements with Cortical Negative Slow Potential Shifts in Monkey and Human

Abstract

The aim of our research during the past decades has been the specification of cognitive functions in circumscribed segments of the monkey’s cerebral cortex. Among the several methods that we have employed is the recording of cortical event-related potentials during the monkey’s performance of a spatial delayed response (DR) task. This technique permits the identification of several component potentials during limited epochs of the DR trial and, with systematic variations of task parameters, specification of the functional significance of each component in relation to the several task demands. The results, as presented here, revealed a surface-negative slow potential (SP) wave from the prefrontal area during the early intratrial delay period that was related to the level of correct DR performance. Our interpretation of this finding, that prefrontal cortex functions in motor programming for spatial responses (Stamm, 1979), seemed to have solved the “riddle of the frontal lobes.”