Phineas
Gage
By Alice and Alyssa
The Case of Phineas Gage
A metal tamping rod impaled Gage through his left
cheek and top of his forehead.
Minutes later Gage was sitting up and talking.
Months later Gage returned to work. Although having
lost his frontal lobe, Gage showed no signs of a
changed mental condition.
However Gage’s previously
reputable personality traits were no more
 Gage had become “aggressive,
uncontrollable and hard to get along
with.” Gage had changed.
Damage to the frontal lobe can
cause:
 Loss of the ability to solve
problems
The Frontal Lobe is responsible
for regulating temperament,
personality and expressing this
personality. Near the back of the
Frontal Lobe is a section called
the Primary Motor Cortex. This
cortex controls voluntary body
movements, including actions
such as kicking your leg.
 Difficulty with planing and
initiating actions, such as
crossing the street
 Difficulty answering a
complex question.
Changes in personality and self
expression
Mood swings
 Receives and processes
visual information like
shape, colour and motion
perception.
 The Primary Visual Cortex
at the base of the Occipital
lobe receives information
from the visual sensory
neurons on the retina and
assists the brain in making
an image.
When damage occurs to
the Occipital lobe, the
person may experience:
 Blindness
 Difficulty with
articulation
 Recognition problems
• Responsible for Somasensory
information such as
temperature. Sensors in the
skin, lips, arms pick up these
feelings. if you have a large
amount of cortical space
committed to the sensors in the
fingers, your fingers will be
ultra sensitive when it comes
to feeling the texture of
something or more easily
controlled when playing an
instrument.
Damage to the Parietal
lobe can cause:
 Loss of feeling in some
areas of the body (Without
feeling it would be
impossible to tell when you
have hurt yourself.)
Temporal lobes are involved
with hearing, memory and
recognition of people’s faces.
The Primary Auditory cortex
registers different pitches and
amplitudes of sounds heard by
the ears. Other parts of the
Association cortex are
involved with storing personal
experiences.
Damage to the temporal lobes
can cause:
 Mild amnesia.
 Changes in behaviour
 Inability to concentrate
 The loss of equilibrium
(balance)
 Increased initiative and
hypotension
Damage to the Wernickes:
 Inability to understand words
 Problems with comprehension
 Difficulty with pronunciation
Bibliography
• http://www.deakin.edu.au/hbs/psychology/g
agepage/
• http://www.mc.maricopa.edu/~reffland/anth
ropology/anthro2003/origins/phineas.html