What We Know and Do Not Know about the Functions of the Orbitofrontal Cortex after 20 Years of Cross-Species Studies

When Pat Goldman-Rakic described the circuitry and function of primate prefrontal cortex in her influential 1987 monograph (Goldman-Rakic, 1987), she included only a few short paragraphs on the orbitofrontal cortex (OFC). That year, there were only nine papers published containing the term “orbitofrontal,” an average of less than one paper per month. Twenty years later, this rate has increased to 32 papers per month. This explosive growth is partly attributable to the remarkable similarities that exist in structure and function across species. These similarities suggest that OFC function can be usefully modeled in nonhuman and even nonprimate species. Here, we review some of these similarities.

• Publication year

  2007

• Venue

  Journal of Neuroscience

• Publication date

  2007-08-01

• Fields of study

  Biology, Medicine

• Identifiers
  DOI 10.1523/JNEUROSCI.1556-07.2007PMID 17670960PMCID PMC2630163
• External record

  Open on Semantic Scholar

• Source metadata

  Semantic Scholar, PubMed

• No claims are published for this paper.

• No concepts are published for this paper.

• Orbitofrontal Cortex and Amygdala Contributions to Affect and Action in Primates

  2007cited by this paper
• Contrasting roles for cingulate and orbitofrontal cortex in decisions and social behaviour.

  2007cited by this paper
• Determining the Neural Substrates of Goal-Directed Learning in the Human Brain

  2007cited by this paper
• Basolateral amygdala lesions abolish orbitofrontal-dependent reversal impairments.

  2007cited by this paper
• Orbitofrontal Cortex Mediates Outcome Encoding in Pavlovian But Not Instrumental Conditioning

  2007cited by this paper
• Cortical substrates for exploratory decisions in humans

  2006cited by this paper
• The Role of the Ventromedial Prefrontal Cortex in Abstract State-Based Inference during Decision Making in Humans

  2006cited by this paper
• Encoding of time-discounted rewards in orbitofrontal cortex is independent of value representation.

  2006cited by this paper
• Primate orbitofrontal cortex and adaptive behaviour.

  2006cited by this paper
• Rhesus monkeys with orbital prefrontal cortex lesions can learn to inhibit prepotent responses in the reversed reward contingency task.

  2006cited by this paper
• Neurons in the orbitofrontal cortex encode economic value

  2006cited by this paper
• Representation of spatial goals in rat orbitofrontal cortex.

  2006cited by this paper
• Orbitofrontal lesions impair use of cue-outcome associations in a devaluation task.

  2005cited by this paper
• Neuronal activity in primate orbitofrontal cortex reflects the value of time.

  2005cited by this paper
• Medial orbitofrontal cortex: its role in mediating satiety in the macaque.

  2005cited by this paper
• Reward-related Reversal Learning after Surgical Excisions in Orbito-frontal or Dorsolateral Prefrontal Cortex in Humans

  2004cited by this paper
• The orbitofrontal cortex: Neuronal activity in the behaving monkey

  2004cited by this paper
• Bilateral Orbital Prefrontal Cortex Lesions in Rhesus Monkeys Disrupt Choices Guided by Both Reward Value and Reward Contingency

  2004cited by this paper
• Dissociating Valence of Outcome from Behavioral Control in Human Orbital and Ventral Prefrontal Cortices

  2003cited by this paper
• Encoding Predictive Reward Value in Human Amygdala and Orbitofrontal Cortex

  2003cited by this paper
• Different Roles for Orbitofrontal Cortex and Basolateral Amygdala in a Reinforcer Devaluation Task

  2003cited by this paper
• Neuronal activity in primate dorsolateral and orbital prefrontal cortex during performance of a reward preference task

  2003influential reference
• Beauty in a smile: the role of medial orbitofrontal cortex in facial attractiveness.

  2003cited by this paper
• Lesions of orbitofrontal cortex and basolateral amygdala complex disrupt acquisition of odor-guided discriminations and reversals.

  2003cited by this paper
• Dissociable Contributions of the Human Amygdala and Orbitofrontal Cortex to Incentive Motivation and Goal Selection

  2003cited by this paper
• Ventromedial frontal cortex mediates affective shifting in humans: evidence from a reversal learning paradigm.

  2003cited by this paper
• Dissociable Contributions of the Orbitofrontal and Infralimbic Cortex to Pavlovian Autoshaping and Discrimination Reversal Learning: Further Evidence for the Functional Heterogeneity of the Rodent Frontal Cortex

  2003cited by this paper
• Neural economics and the biological substrates of valuation.

  2002cited by this paper
• Neural Economics and the Biological Substrates of Valuation

  2002cited by this paper
• Appetitive and Aversive Olfactory Learning in Humans Studied Using Event-Related Functional Magnetic Resonance Imaging

  2002cited by this paper
• Single neurons in prefrontal cortex encode abstract rules

  2001cited by this paper
• Abstract reward and punishment representations in the human orbitofrontal cortex

  2001cited by this paper
• Neural Correlates of Olfactory Recognition Memory in the Rat Orbitofrontal Cortex

  2000cited by this paper
• Effects of excitotoxic lesions in the ventral striatopallidal–thalamocortical pathway on odor reversal learning: inability to extinguish an incorrect response

  2000cited by this paper
• Delay activity of orbital and lateral prefrontal neurons of the monkey varying with different rewards.

  2000cited by this paper
• Neural Encoding in Orbitofrontal Cortex and Basolateral Amygdala during Olfactory Discrimination Learning

  1999cited by this paper
• Orbitofrontal Cortex and Representation of Incentive Value in Associative Learning

  1999cited by this paper
• Relative reward preference in primate orbitofrontal cortex

  1999cited by this paper
• Deciding Advantageously Before Knowing the Advantageous Strategy

  1997cited by this paper
• Hunger and satiety modify the responses of olfactory and visual neurons in the primate orbitofrontal cortex.

  1996cited by this paper
• Dissociation in prefrontal cortex of affective and attentional shifts

  1996cited by this paper
• Do Rats Have Prefrontal Cortex? The Rose-Woolsey-Akert Program Reconsidered

  1995cited by this paper
• On Neural Circuits and Cognition

  1995cited by this paper
• Circuitry of Primate Prefrontal Cortex and Regulation of Behavior by Representational Memory

  1987cited by this paper
• Differential effects of two ways of devaluing the unconditioned stimulus after Pavlovian appetitive conditioning.

  1979cited by this paper
• Perseveration in extinction and in discrimination reversal tasks following selective frontal ablations in Macaca mulatta

  1969cited by this paper
• The Frontal Granular Cortex and Behavior.

  1964cited by this paper
• A COMPARISON OF EFFECTS OF ORBITOFRONTAL AND HIPPOCAMPAL LESIONS UPON DISCRIMINATION LEARNING AND REVERSAL IN THE CAT.

  1964cited by this paper
• Behavioral/systems/cognitive Selective Aspiration or Neurotoxic Lesions of Orbital Frontal Areas 11 and 13 Spared Monkeys' Performance on the Object Discrimination Reversal Task

  year unknowncited by this paper

• A multi-dimensional transfer learning framework for studying reward-guided behaviors across species

  2025cites this paper
• Distinct contributions of anterior and posterior orbitofrontal cortex to outcome-guided behavior

  2025cites this paper
• Attention in our digital ecosystem: The five interactive components that drive media multitasking

  2025cites this paper
• A Review of the Psychological and Neural Mechanisms of Watching Mukbang: Motivations, Effects and Future Directions

  2024cites this paper
• Neuroanatomy of the nociceptive system: From nociceptors to brain networks.

  2024cites this paper
• “Non-Eloquent” brain regions predict neuropsychological outcome in tumor patients undergoing awake craniotomy

  2024cites this paper
• Gaze-centered gating, reactivation, and reevaluation of economic value in orbitofrontal cortex

  2024cites this paper
• The Orbitofrontal Cortex Is Required for Learned Modulation of Innate Olfactory Behavior

  2024cites this paper
• Adapting to Changes in Communication: The Orbitofrontal Cortex in Language and Speech Processing

  2024cites this paper
• Obsessive–compulsive disorder after traumatic injury to the right frontal and left temporal lobes: A case report

  2024cites this paper
• Gaze-centered gating and reactivation of value encoding in orbitofrontal cortex

  2023cites this paper
• Human ventromedial prefrontal cortex lesions enhance the effect of expectations on pain perception

  2023cites this paper
• How Instructions, Learning, and Expectations Shape Pain and Neurobiological Responses

  2023cites this paper
• No association between isotretinoin and impulsivity in patients with moderate‐to‐severe acne vulgaris

  2023cites this paper
• Analysis of collateral projections from the lateral orbitofrontal cortex to nucleus accumbens and basolateral amygdala in rats.

  2022cites this paper
• Orbitofrontal Cortex is necessary for the behavioural expression, but not learning, of Pavlovian conditioned inhibition

  2022cites this paper
• Prelimbic cortex neural encoding dynamically tracks expected outcome value

  2022cites this paper
• The medial temporal lobe structure and function support positive affect.

  2022cites this paper
• The prediction-error hypothesis of schizophrenia: new data point to circuit-specific changes in dopamine activity

  2021cites this paper
• Estratégias de análise do desenvolvimento motor em crianças com dificuldade de aprendizagem: uma revisão integrativa

  2021cites this paper
• Controlling one’s world: Identification of sub-regions of primate PFC underlying goal-directed behavior

  2021cites this paper
• Depressive symptoms following traumatic brain injury are associated with resting-state functional connectivity

  2021cites this paper
• Prefrontal contributions to action control in rodents.

  2021cites this paper
• Escitalopram Restores Reversal Learning Impairments in Rats with Lesions of Orbital Frontal Cortex

  2021cites this paper
• Noninvasive Brain Stimulation Rescues Cocaine-Induced Prefrontal Hypoactivity and Restores Flexible Behavior.

  2021cites this paper
• Lower neural value signaling in the prefrontal cortex is related to childhood family income and depressive symptomatology during adolescence

  2021cites this paper
• Monitoring of Self-Paced Action Timing and Sensory Outcomes After Lesions to the Orbitofrontal Cortex

  2021cites this paper
• Defining an Orbitofrontal Compass: Functional and Anatomical Heterogeneity Across Anterior–Posterior and Medial–Lateral Axes

  2021cites this paper
• The modulation of attentional deployment on regret: an event-related potential study

  2021cites this paper
• Human ventromedial prefrontal cortex lesions enhance expectation-related pain modulation

  2021cites this paper
• Cortico-cortical connectivity behind acoustic information transfer to mouse orbitofrontal cortex is sensitive to neuromodulation and displays local sensory gating: relevance in disorders with auditory hallucinations?

  2021cites this paper
• Neural underpinnings of morality judgment and moral aesthetic judgment

  2021cites this paper
• The rodent lateral orbitofrontal cortex as an arbitrator selecting between model-based and model-free learning systems.

  2021cites this paper
• The hippocampus and orbitofrontal cortex jointly represent task structure during memory-guided decision making

  2021cites this paper
• Mice with exonic RELN deletion identified from a patient with schizophrenia have impaired visual discrimination learning and reversal learning in touchscreen operant tasks.

  2021cites this paper
• Frontal lobe syndrome and dementias

  2020cites this paper
• Psychological and Neural Evidence for Reinforcement Learning: A Survey

  2020cites this paper
• The Role of the Rodent Lateral Orbitofrontal Cortex in Simple Pavlovian Cue-Outcome Learning Depends on Training Experience

  2020cites this paper
• Reinforcement learning and its connections with neuroscience and psychology

  2020cites this paper
• Existential givens, religion, and neuroscience

  2020cites this paper
• Maltreatment and Emotional Development

  2020cites this paper
• From Isolated Emotional Memories to Their Competition During Conflict

  2020cites this paper
• Gray Matter Changes in the Orbitofrontal-Paralimbic Cortex in Male Youths With Non-comorbid Conduct Disorder

  2020cites this paper
• The orbitofrontal cartographer.

  2020cites this paper
• DISSECTING THE DETERMINANTS OF DECISIONS: SEX DIFFERENCES AND DISTRIBUTED REINFORCEMENT REVEALED IN A RAT CHOICE TASK

  2019cites this paper
• Orbitofrontal control of visual cortex gain promotes visual associative learning

  2019cites this paper
• The Graded Change in Connectivity across the Ventromedial Prefrontal Cortex Reveals Distinct Subregions

  2019cites this paper
• Cognitive and Neuroanatomic Accounts of Referential Communication in Focal Dementia

  2019cites this paper
• MEASURING GLUTAMATE AND OXYGEN IN BRAIN REWARD CIRCUITS IN ANIMAL MODELS OF COCAINE ABUSE AND DECISION-MAKING

  2019cites this paper
• Neurobiologische Grundlagen unbewusster Prozesse und deren Bedeutung für die Psychotherapie

  2019cites this paper
• Precision neuroradiology: mapping the nodes and networks that link genes to behaviour

  2019cites this paper
• The Transition from Evaluation to Selection Involves Neural Subspace Reorganization in Core Reward Regions.

  2019cites this paper
• Performance in delayed non-matching to sample task predicts the diagnosis of obsessive–compulsive disorder

  2019cites this paper
• Neuroeconomics and modern neuroscience

  2019cites this paper
• An Integrated Model of Action Selection: Distinct Modes of Cortical Control of Striatal Decision Making.

  2019cites this paper
• Value representations in the rodent orbitofrontal cortex drive learning, not choice

  2018cites this paper
• Quantitative assessment of prefrontal cortex in humans relative to nonhuman primates

  2018cites this paper
• Inactivation of the Ventrolateral Orbitofrontal Cortex Impairs Flexible Use of Safety Signals.

  2018cites this paper
• Multimodal Neuroimaging of Emotion Regulation Strategies in Clinical and Healthy Control Samples

  2018influential citation
• Explicit and Implicit Emotion Regulation

  2018cites this paper
• Functional heterogeneity within the rodent lateral orbitofrontal cortex dissociates outcome devaluation and reversal learning deficits

  2018cites this paper
• Memory Retention Involves the Ventrolateral Orbitofrontal Cortex: Comparison with the Basolateral Amygdala

  2018cites this paper
• Contributions of Lateral and Orbital Frontal Regions to Abstract Rule Acquisition and Reversal in Monkeys

  2018cites this paper
• Linguistic Aspects of Primary Progressive Aphasia.

  2018cites this paper
• The role of the orbitofrontal cortex in alcohol use, abuse, and dependence

  2018cites this paper
• The Experience of Pleasure: A Perspective Between Neuroscience and Psychoanalysis

  2018cites this paper
• Memory Retention Involves the Ventrolateral Orbitofrontal Cortex: Comparison with the Basolateral Amygdala

  2018cites this paper
• Organization of afferents to the orbitofrontal cortex in the rat

  2018cites this paper
• The rodent lateral orbitofrontal cortex represents expected Pavlovian outcome value but not identity

  2018cites this paper
• Investigating the Relationship Between Sulcogyral Patterns and Structural and Functional Connectivity Metrics in the Orbitofrontal Cortex

  2018cites this paper
• Efeitos psicofisiológicos da música motivacional durante corrida de 5km.

  2018cites this paper
• Decision-Making Deficits Associated with Amyloidosis in Lewy Body Disorders

  2017cites this paper
• Child Maltreatment: Consequences, Mechanisms, and Implications for Parenting

  2017cites this paper
• Frontal‐subcortical circuitry in social attachment and relationships: A cross‐sectional fMRI ALE meta‐analysis

  2017cites this paper
• A State Representation for Reinforcement Learning and Decision-Making in the Orbitofrontal Cortex

  2017cites this paper
• Reward magnitude tracking by neural populations in ventral striatum

  2017cites this paper
• Contributions of different prefrontal cortical regions to abstract rule acquisition and reversal in monkeys

  2017cites this paper
• Evidence of a role for orbital prefrontal cortex in preventing over-generalization to moderate predictors of biologically significant events.

  2017cites this paper
• A Quantitative Assessment of Prefrontal Cortex in Humans Relative to Nonhuman Primates

  2017cites this paper
• Orbitofrontal cortex reflects changes in response-outcome contingencies during probabilistic reversal learning.

  2017cites this paper
• Explicit and implicit emotion regulation: a multi-level framework

  2017cites this paper
• Chapter 21 – Organization of Prefrontal-Striatal Connections

  2017cites this paper
• Emotion Regulation in Relation to Cognitive Functioning in the Preclinical Stages of Dementia

  2016cites this paper
• Modeling cognitive flexibility in alcohol dependence

  2016cites this paper
• Behavioural responses in uncertain conditions are influenced by the orbital prefrontal cortex

  2016cites this paper
• Top-Down Dysregulation—From ADHD to Emotional Instability

  2016cites this paper
• Vision, Memory, and Cognition in Drosophila

  2016cites this paper
• Instructed knowledge shapes feedback-driven aversive learning in striatum and orbitofrontal cortex, but not the amygdala

  2016cites this paper
• An Avoidance-Based Rodent Model of Exposure With Response Prevention Therapy for Obsessive-Compulsive Disorder.

  2016cites this paper
• Affect development as a need to preserve homeostasis.

  2016cites this paper
• The contributions of resting state and task-based functional connectivity studies to our understanding of adolescent brain network maturation.

  2016cites this paper
• Nucleus Accumbens Core and Shell Differentially Encode Reward-Associated Cues after Reinforcer Devaluation

  2016cites this paper
• Libet-style experiments, neuroscience, and libertarian free will

  2016cites this paper
• Efeitos psicofisiológicos da música motivacional durante corrida de cinco quilómetros. Um estudo piloto

  2016cites this paper
• Mental Health Co-morbidity in Children and Adolescents with Fetal Alcohol Spectrum Disorder

  2016cites this paper
• A core eating network and its modulations underlie diverse eating phenomena.

  2016cites this paper
• PTSD and olfaction: the aetiology of PTSD and the bidirectional relationship between trauma and sensitisation.

  2015cites this paper
• Brain metabolic abnormalities during gait with freezing in Parkinson's disease.

  2015cites this paper
• Neural correlates of high-risk behavior tendencies and impulsivity in an emotional Go/NoGo fMRI task

  2015cites this paper
• Lesions of either anterior orbitofrontal cortex or ventrolateral prefrontal cortex in marmoset monkeys heighten innate fear and attenuate active coping behaviors to predator threat

  2015cites this paper