Functional topography of the cerebellum for motor and cognitive tasks: an fMRI study

By Catherine J. Stoodley, Eve M. Valera, Jeremy D. Schmahmann. NeuroImage, 2011

1,047 citations recorded by the source corpus.

Anatomical, clinical and imaging findings suggest that the cerebellum is engaged in cognitive and affective functions as well as motor control. Evidence from converging modalities also indicates that there is a functional topography in the human cerebellum for overt control of movement vs. higher functions, such that the cerebellum can be divided into zones depending on connectivity with sensorimotor vs. multimodal association cortices. Using functional MRI, we show that regions active during overt movement differ from those involved in higher-level language, spatial processing and working memory tasks. Nine healthy participants each completed five tasks in order to determine the relative activation patterns for the different paradigms. Right-handed finger-tapping activated right cerebellar lobules IV-V and VIII, consistent with descriptions of the cerebellar homunculi. Verb generation engaged right cerebellar lobules VI-Crus I and a second cluster in lobules VIIB-VIIIA. Mental rotation activation peaks were localized to medial left cerebellar lobule VII (Crus II). A 2-back working memory task activated bilateral regions of lobules VI-VII. Viewing arousing vs. neutral images did not reliably activate the cerebellum or cerebral limbic areas in this study. The cerebellar functional topography identified in this study reflects the involvement of different cerebro-cerebellar circuits depending on the demands of the task being performed: overt movement activated sensorimotor cortices along with contralateral cerebellar lobules IV-VI and VIII, whereas more cognitively demanding tasks engaged prefrontal and parietal cortices along with cerebellar lobules VI and VII. These findings provide further support for a cerebellar role in both motor and cognitive tasks, and better establish the existence of functional subregions in the cerebellum. Future studies are needed to determine the exact contribution of the cerebellum – and different cerebro-cerebellar circuits – to task performance.

Subfields: Cognitive Neuroscience, Neurology, Social Psychology

View Paper: https://www.semanticscholar.org/paper/177d06732f33bc2d85dc3ec94c7bfa44ccf3cbf6

How researchers see this paper

The researchers whose trusted networks rank it highest, strongest advocate first. Every researcher gets a different order.

In Cognitive Neuroscience

1. Kris Baetens
2. Marie Vandekerckhove
3. F. Van Overwalle
4. John D. E. Gabrieli
5. Xavier Guell
6. Jeremy D. Schmahmann
7. S. Wang
8. Aleksandra Badura

In Neurology

1. John D. E. Gabrieli
2. Xavier Guell
3. Jeremy D. Schmahmann
4. Peter Mariën
5. S. Wang
6. Marie Vandekerckhove
7. F. Van Overwalle
8. Kris Baetens

In Social Psychology

1. Kris Baetens
2. Marie Vandekerckhove
3. John D. E. Gabrieli
4. Xavier Guell
5. F. Van Overwalle
6. Jeremy D. Schmahmann
7. Peter Mariën
8. S. Wang

Citations in the corpus

• TRIPLE REPRESENTATION OF LANGUAGE, WORKING MEMORY, SOCIAL AND EMOTION PROCESSING IN THE CEREBELLUM: CONVERGENT EVIDENCE FROM TASK AND SEED-BASED RESTING-STATE FMRI ANALYSES IN A SINGLE LARGE COHORT (2018, methodology): “We also found left and right lobule VI activation, a finding that had been previously reported in Stoodley and Schmahmann, 2009 and Stoodley et al., 2012, but that was not replicated in Keren-Happuch et al., 2014.”
• Social cognition and the cerebellum: A meta-analysis of over 350 fMRI studies (2014, background): “New evidence recently compiled and summarized by Stoodley, Schmahmann and colleagues (Stoodley and Schmahmann, 2009, 2010; Stoodley et al., 2012, 2013) and Mariën and colleagues (De Smet et al., 2013; Mariën et al., 2013a, 2013b) provides converging evidence in support of a crucial role of the…”
• The Cerebellum, Sensitive Periods, and Autism (2014, background): “Evidence for cerebellar lesions leading to nonmotor deficits has come from adult cases showing subtle cognitive and affective changes (Stoodley et al., 2012) and congenital cerebellar defects, where deficits aremuchmore pronounced (Basson and Wingate, 2013; Steinlin and Wingeier, 2013).”
• Timing rules for synaptic plasticity matched to behavioral function (2016, neutral): “This wide range of effective delays may reflect the wide range of delays in the error signals carried by the different climbing fiber inputs to the cerebellar vermis, which supports behavioral functions ranging from postural to cognitive (Menghini et al., 2013; Stoodley et al., 2012).”