Logic is widely considered the basis of rationality. Logical choices, however, are often influenced by emotional responses, sometimes to our detriment, sometimes to our advantage. To understand the neural basis of emotionally neutral and emotionally salient reasoning we studied 19 volunteers using event-related fMRI, as they made logical judgments about arguments that varied in emotional saliency. Despite identical logical form and content categories across “hot” and “cold” reasoning conditions, lateral and ventral medial prefrontal cortex showed reciprocal response patterns as a (...) function of emotional saliency of content. “Cold” reasoning trials resulted in enhanced activity in lateral/dorsal lateral prefrontal cortex and suppression of activity in ventral medial prefrontal cortex. By contrast, “hot” reasoning trials resulted in enhanced activation in VMPFC and suppression of activation in L/DLPFC. This reciprocal engagement of L/DLPFC and VMPFC provides evidence for a dynamic neural system for reasoning, the configuration of which is strongly influenced by emotional saliency. (shrink)

Although deductive reasoning is a closed system, one's beliefs about the world can influence validity judgements. To understand the associated functional neuroanatomy of this belief-bias we studied 14 volunteers using event-related fMRI, as they performed reasoning tasks under neutral, facilitatory and inhibitory belief conditions. We found evidence for the engagement of a left temporal lobe system during belief-based reasoning and a bilateral parietal lobe system during belief-neutral reasoning. Activation of right lateral prefrontal cortex was evident when subjects inhibited a prepotent (...) response associated with belief-bias and correctly completed a logical task, a finding consistent with its putative role in cognitive monitoring. By contrast, when logical reasoning was overcome by belief-bias, there was engagement of ventral medial prefrontal cortex, a region implicated in affective processing. This latter involvement suggests that belief-bias effects in reasoning may be mediated through an influence of emotional processes on reasoning. (shrink)

A key question for cognitive theories of reasoning is whether logical reasoning is inherently a sentential linguistic process or a process requiring spatial manipulation and search. We addressed this question in an event-related fMRI study of syllogistic reasoning, using sentences with and without semantic content. Our findings indicate involvement of two dissociable networks in deductive reasoning. During content-based reasoning a left hemisphere temporal system was recruited. By contrast, a formally identical reasoning task, which lacked semantic content, activated a parietal system. (...) The two systems share common components in bilateral basal ganglia nuclei, right cerebellum, bilateral fusiform gyri, and left prefrontal cortex. We conclude that syllogistic reasoning is implemented in two distinct systems whose engagement is primarily a function of the presence or absence of semantic content. Furthermore, when a logical argument results in a belief–logic conflict, the nature of the reasoning process is changed by recruitment of the right prefrontal cortex. (shrink)