Question

After a long night of drinking with his buddies, a young man accidentally falls off a two story balcony, hurting his head in the incident.

Doctors soon learn that the man has lost some basic communication skills, including not being able to read or write.

Based on this information, identify the area or areas may be damaged in his brain.

Answer 1

The person is likely to have suffered injury in the system of regions towards the back and middle of the brain which help us interpret the text. These include the Broca areas, angular gyrus in the parietal lobe, Wernicke’s area (comprising mainly the top rear portion of the temporal lobe), insular cortex, basal ganglia and cerebellum.

It isn’t most likely that the Regions in the frontal, temporal and parietal lobes have been affected due to the fall as these areas constitute the motor cortex and are involved in formulation of speech, writing and comprehension of spoken and written words . Most of this language-related brain activity is likely occurring in the left side of the brain and therefore the left hemisphere may have incurred more injuries.