Skip Navigation

Social Cognitive and Affective Neuroscience 2007 2(2):84-92; doi:10.1093/scan/nsm001
This Article
Right arrow Full Text Freely available
Right arrow FREE Full Text (PDF) Freely available
Right arrow E-letters: Submit a response
Right arrow Alert me when this article is cited
Right arrow Alert me when E-letters are posted
Right arrow Alert me if a correction is posted
Services
Right arrow Email this article to a friend
Right arrow Similar articles in this journal
Right arrow Similar articles in PubMed
Right arrow Alert me to new issues of the journal
Right arrow Add to My Personal Archive
Right arrow Download to citation manager
Right arrow Request Permissions
Google Scholar
Right arrow Articles by Ciaramelli, E.
Right arrow Articles by di Pellegrino, G.
Right arrow Search for Related Content
PubMed
Right arrow PubMed Citation
Right arrow Articles by Ciaramelli, E.
Right arrow Articles by di Pellegrino, G.
Social Bookmarking
Add to CiteULike   Add to Connotea   Add to Del.icio.us  
What's this?

© The Author (2007). Published by Oxford University Press. For Permissions, please email: journals.permissions@oxfordjournals.org

Selective deficit in personal moral judgment following damage to ventromedial prefrontal cortex

Elisa Ciaramelli1,2, Michela Muccioli2, Elisabetta Làdavas1,2 and Giuseppe di Pellegrino1,2

1Dipartimento di Psicologia, Università di Bologna, Bologna, Italy, and 2Centro Studi e Ricerche di Neuroscienze Cognitive, Cesena, Italy

Recent fMRI evidence has detected increased medial prefrontal activation during contemplation of personal moral dilemmas compared to impersonal ones, which suggests that this cortical region plays a role in personal moral judgment. However, functional imaging results cannot definitively establish that a brain area is necessary for a particular cognitive process. This requires evidence from lesion techniques, such as studies of human patients with focal brain damage. Here, we tested 7 patients with lesions in the ventromedial prefrontal cortex and 12 healthy individuals in personal moral dilemmas, impersonal moral dilemmas and non-moral dilemmas. Compared to normal controls, patients were more willing to judge personal moral violations as acceptable behaviors in personal moral dilemmas, and they did so more quickly. In contrast, their performance in impersonal and non-moral dilemmas was comparable to that of controls. These results indicate that the ventromedial prefrontal cortex is necessary to oppose personal moral violations, possibly by mediating anticipatory, self-focused, emotional reactions that may exert strong influence on moral choice and behavior.

Keywords: moral judgment; ventromedial prefrontal cortex; emotion; cognition; decision-making; lesion method

Correspondence should be addressed to Giuseppe di Pellegrino, Dipartimento di Psicologia, Università di Bologna, Viale Berti Pichat 5 – 40127 Bologna, Italy. E-mail: g.dipellegrino{at}unibo.it.

Received January 23, 2007. Accepted February 5, 2007.


Add to CiteULike CiteULike   Add to Connotea Connotea   Add to Del.icio.us Del.icio.us    What's this?


This article has been cited by other articles:


Home page
 Proc. Natl. Acad. Sci. USAHome page
J. D. Greene and J. M. Paxton
Patterns of neural activity associated with honest and dishonest moral decisions
PNAS, July 28, 2009; 106(30): 12506 - 12511.
[Abstract] [Full Text] [PDF]

Home page
 Br Med BullHome page
L. Young and M. Koenigs
Investigating emotion in moral cognition: a review of evidence from functional neuroimaging and neuropsychology
Br. Med. Bull., December 1, 2007; 84(1): 69 - 79.
[Abstract] [Full Text] [PDF]


Disclaimer: Please note that abstracts for content published before 1996 were created through digital scanning and may therefore not exactly replicate the text of the original print issues. All efforts have been made to ensure accuracy, but the Publisher will not be held responsible for any remaining inaccuracies. If you require any further clarification, please contact our Customer Services Department.