PSYC31H3 Lecture Notes - Perseveration, Motor Skill, Frontal Lobe
19 Apr 2013
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Document Summary
The most complex behaviours, are the ability to respond in an adaptive manner to novel situations and are also the basis of many cognitive, emotional, and social skills. Can be conceptualized as having four components: volition, planning and decision making, purposive action, effective performance. Each executive function involves a distinctive set of activity related behaviours necessary for appropriate, socially responsible, and effectively self-serving adult conduct. Defective executive behaviour typically involves a cluster of deficiencies of which one or two may be especially prominent. Subcortical as well as cortical damage can impair executive function. A major obstacle in examining executive functions is maintaining the structure of the examination setting, while at the same time allowing patients the leeway to make their own decisions. Refers to the complex process of determining what one needs or wants and conceptualizing some kind of future realization of that need or want. Many individuals who lack volitional capacity simply do not think of anything to do.
