FIGURE 14-5 Memory Distribution Blood flow in left-hemisphere regions increases when participants generate color words (red) and action words (blue) to describe static black-and-white drawings of objects. Purple areas indicate overlap. The red region extends into the ventral temporal lobe, suggesting that object memory is organized as a distributed system. Objects’ attributes are stored close to the cortical regions that mediate their perceptions. Parietal lobe activation likely is related to movements associated with action words, and frontal lobe activation, to the spontaneously generated behavior.

Information from A. Martin, J. V. Haxby, F. M. Lalonde, C. L. Wiggs, & L. G. Ungerleider (1995). Discrete cortical regions associated with knowledge of color and knowledge of action. Science, 270, p. 104.