Structure/function: The Parietal Lobe
Behold! Your parietal lobe! You can thank this lobe for your ability to slap yourself in the face! You’re welcome!
Because it allows you to know where in space your hand is, where in space your face is, and where they are in relation to each other. Congratulations! If you have parietal lobe issues, you might have issues slapping yourself in the face… among other issues but those are probably not relevant.
More specifically, the parietal lobe is split up into the above sections. First you have the somatosensory cortex
(This post was brought to you by me, figuring out how to “remove background” on an image and abusing this newfound power). So with the hand slapping thing, you will feel both your hand making contact with your face, and your face being slapped, thanks to this doohickey!
The superior and supramarginal cortices are visual, so it guides your movement to, say, pick up a water bottle. And slap yourself in the face, although you can do that with your eyes closed (go ahead, try it). That’s thanks to the posterior cingulate gyrus but we will get there later because it is a LOT. For now we have the friendly, simple
Angular Gyrus, which does what it says. So thinking about your place in space, where you want to go, where you’ve been, which way is north, which way is your house. Boom. Angular Gyrus. The Angular Gyrus and the Supramarginal Gyrus together make up the inferior parietal lobule (sub-lobe)
Now on the OTHER side of the parietal cortex (cut your brain in half, saggitally, to expose this part) (don’t cut, like, YOUR brain in half… couldn’t learn much then, could you) (actually) (we won’t go there). Episodic memory retrieval=who, what, when, where, and emotions of memories.Makes sense this is with visuo-spatial imagery. When you imagine up these memories, you envision the location of these memories and where these memories took place. Self-consciousness is also related to this area (but not exclusively located here. It’s pretty well understood that’s not located in one area but processed throughout the brain. NOW for the REAL doosy
Phew. Look at that. And such a small area. It is primarily known for its role in the Dorsal Stream in visual processing. A lot of its other roles kind of relate to this, as it is also known as the “where” stream. So spacial awareness, movements in space, mental rotation (that skill on IQ tests where they give you the shape and ask you to ID the shape from another angle), mental imagery, manipulation of visual imagery. So your understanding and manipulation of space. Interestingly (possibly connected) math and reading abilities are also highly related to this area. Spatial and non-spatial working memory (temporary memory holding, decision making), response inhibition, and task switching are all related to this area. Which is interesting because they are also all related to the medial prefrontal cortex. Pathway?? (Probably, I haven’t looked into it)
Medial Parietal-Pain processing and meditation
Intraparietal Sulcus-Saccadic eye movements, attention, reaching, grasping, tactile manipulation of objects, observing hand movements, passive tool use, object matching and object size and orientation discrimination. (aka REALLY relevant for slapping yourself)
So there you have it. The overall structures and their functions within the parietal lobe!
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