Study of the Neural Basis of Analogical Reasoning

Organisation du Cortex préfrontal ventrolatéral Pour l'Analogie: Approche Bimodale Chez le Sujet Sain et Chez le Patient Ayant un Syndrome Frontal.

Frontal patients are impaired in categorisation and analogical reasoning tasks, and different functional imaging studies from our group have shown the involvement of the prefrontal cortex in categorisation and analogy tasks. The aim of this project is to test our hypotheses about the role of the prefrontal cortex in explicit and implicit categorisation and analogy tasks.

Inclusion Criteria:

Healthy subjects:

• subject affiliated to national health insurance
• informed consent signed
• normal neurological examination
• subject aged at least 20

Patients:

• FTD or PSP diagnostic criteria filled
• patient affiliated to national health insurance
• informed consent signed

Exclusion Criteria:

• Severe psychiatric symptomatology and psychotropic drug use
• unability to understand or perform the cognitive tasks.