A

Cognitive Styles 35

and a person will act inappropriately, doing things such as going to the
bathroom in public places without feeling shame. Of course, some people
act inappropriately without the benefit of a lobotomy. In their case, the
behavior is not the result of missing brain hardware, but rather of
inadequate mental software. The influence of the internal world can also be
reduced through the help of drugs and alcohol. To misquote an old saying,
“I can either have a bottle in front of me, or a frontal lobotomy.” A
The composite styles, in contrast, do not seem to be associated
primarily with the cortex of the brain. I have mentioned that the three
composite styles form a mental loop which drives thought and action. A
loop, just as we have described, exists in what is called the subcortex of the
human brain. This is the region that can be seen when the brain is opened
up and the cortex removed, which is why it is called subcortical.B
Memories are not stored in the subcortex. Instead, the subcortical brain
takes the information from the cortex in each hemisphere, processes it in a
region called the basal ganglia and then sends it back to the cortex through
another brain center called the thalamus. I suggest (final reminder: This is
original with me) that this is the loop which is used in visual and verbal
imagination, with verbal imagination occurring in the subcortex of the left
hemisphere, and visual imagination happening in the subcortex of the right
hemisphere.C In other words, what we call imagination is actually the
operation of the three composite styles, and the way in which we react to
imagination and the control which we have over imagination depends upon
which mental room is conscious.

The four simple styles are located in the cortex of the brain.

A The medical history of the frontal lobotomy is a real horror story. In its

most popular form, the surgeon stuck an ice pick behind the eye of the
patient, pushed the blade into the front of the brain, and stirred. This
procedure was carried out in the doctor‟s office under local anesthetic.
Thousands of humans were mentally murdered this way in order to further
the careers of a few aspiring physicians.
B Many terms in neurology are equally inspired. The substantia nigra, for

example, is simply Latin for the black substance. The term which I like
best is the substantia innominata, Latin for the unnamed substance.
C Some of the latest papers on the basal ganglia describe exactly this

concept of a loop of imagination and even mention the distinction between
Exhorter and Contributor type processing.

This does not mean that the composite styles do not use the cortex at all. It
appears that each of the three composite styles is also associated with a
certain region of the cortex. However, the simple styles use predominantly
cortical processing and the composite styles focus upon subcortical thought.