> What is Brain Injury? > Cognitive Skill of the Brain

The brain makes our hearts beat, our eyes blink and our skin shiver. It enables us to love, think, reason, forgive, create, and remember. It controls many automatic responses such as breathing, digestion and motor reflexes. The brain signals our next move.

Frontal Lobe

Temporal Lobe

Occipital Lobe

Parietal Lobe

Cerebellum

Functions

Observed Problems

Brain Stem

Functions

Observed Problems

The Parietal Lobe
The parietal lobe is largely responsible for construction ability and language. Injury to the front parts of this lobe may cause someone to lose sensation on parts of the body. With an injury in this area, one may become disoriented. Recall of long term memories may be mixed up in time or sequencing. They may become easily lost or confuse left and right. They may have difficulty recognizing or naming what they see. Injury may also produce disorders in the ability to read, write or perform math calculations. This area also includes conscious sensation and voluntary motion.

The Occipital Lobe
Injury to this area usually results in "blindness" to part or all of the visual field. Usually people experience "holes" or "blind spots" in what they see. There may be problems picking things out of space or they may misperceive pictures or objects. Recognition of colors may also be disturbed.

The Frontal Lobe
The frontal lobe links and integrates all components of behavior at the highest level. Emotion and social adjustment and impulse control are also localized here. Injury to parts of the frontal lobe may cause an inability to move part of the body or the whole side of the body. Speech may become halting, disorganized or be stopped except for single explosive words. Personality may change. Social rules of behavior may be disregarded. The executive functions, planning, abstract reasoning, impulse control, sustained attention and insight are all located here. The frontal lobe is highly susceptible to injury.

Temporal Lobe
The temporal lobe perceives and recognizes verbal material. It is among the most frequently injured parts of the brain during head injury. A person may have difficulty screening out distractions. Injury to the upper temporal area can cause someone to misunderstand what is said. They may also make sounds like words but which are not recognizable as words at all. They may also misunderstand body language. Emotional changes such as unexplained panic or unexpected tearfulness may be noted. Left temporal area includes production of speech, naming and verbal memory. The right temporal area includes musical abilities, foreign languages, visual memory and comprehension of the environment.

Brain Stem
The brain stem plays a vital role in basic attention, arousal, and consciousness. All information to and from our body passes through the brain stem on the way to or from our brain. Like the frontal and temporal lobes, the brain stem is located in an area near bony protrusions making it vulnerable to damage during trauma.

The Cerebellum
Obtaining a general understanding of the brain and its functions is important to understanding the rehabilitation process. It is very important, however, to understand that the rehabilitation professional is concerned with the whole person. The identification of individual problems gives the rehabilitation team areas in which to focus treatment plans, all of these plans are designed to work toward the rehabilitation of the whole person. Each problem area affects other areas and many times resolving one problem has a major impact on other problems. For example, reestablishing postural balance and eliminating dizziness greatly enhances concentration and attention which allows for improved cognition and problem solving.