Brain's centres for emotional intelligence discovered, thanks to Vietnam veterans' injuries

[link to www.newscientist.com]

Seats of emotional intelligence found in the brain

* 13 January 2010
* Magazine issue 2742. Subscribe and get 4 free issues.
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HEAD injuries sustained by Vietnam veterans have revealed parts of the brain vital for two types of emotional intelligence.

Depending on the site of their injuries, the veterans studied were poor either at "experiential" emotional intelligence (the capacity to judge emotions in other people) or "strategic" emotional intelligence (the ability to plan socially appropriate responses to situations).

Led by Jordan Grafman at the National Institute of Neurological Disorders and Stroke in Bethesda, Maryland, researchers gave standard tests for measuring emotional intelligence to 38 injured vets and 29 healthy controls. The 17 vets with injuries to their dorsolateral prefrontal cortex performed worse on experiential tasks but performed normally on strategic tasks. In the other 21 vets, who had damage to their ventromedial prefrontal cortex, the situation was reversed (Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, DOI: 10.1073/pnas.0912568106).

Damage to these regions didn't affect cognitive intelligence, suggesting that emotional and general problem-solving tasks are handled independently in the brain.