What is the role of broca area Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 500 words

What is the role of broca area - Essay Example The region was named after a French neurosurgeon called Paul Broca who is responsible for the discovery of the role of Brocas area when he was examining the brains of patients who had difficulty in language. Anybody with damaged Brocas area of their brain will not be able to understand the language properly, but they will have difficulty in the speech formation and production. Another brain region called Wernickes area is connected to Broca’s area (Grodzinsky, pg. 7). The Wernickes area is also responsible for the understanding and processing language, and when the area is damaged, it lead to a deficiency of language but one fail to remember the details. Together with the Wernickes area, Broca’s area is located within the left hemisphere of the brain. Given its role in language production and understanding, Broca’s area has a perfect proximity to the motor cortex, therefore, the neurons from the Broca area sends signals to the larynx, to the tongue and finally to the mouth motor areas. The mouth motor area then sends the signal to the corresponding muscles which, therefore, facilitates the creation of sounds. According to a recent study on the functions of the left frontal gyrus in the verbal fluency, it is found that the pars opercularis (Brodmann area 44) sub-serves phonological fluency while pars triangularis (Brodmann area 45) is responsible for the semantic fluency (Grodzinsky, pg. 19). Being located within the frontal lobe of the brain, Brocas Area is linked to the human language and speech. Brocas Area is strictly associated with the production of language, it also has an important role in the understanding of language as well, and also deals with production of speech related actions and gestures. A person with damaged Brocas Area will suffer from Brocas Aphasia, which does not interfere with the way a person understands a language but will make the person have a