Bilateral cingulotomy
Neuroimaging also uncovered different sub-regions in the anterior cingulate cortex itself based on their function. These studies showed that the caudal part of the anterior cingulate cortex plays a more important function in cognitive activities that involve attention, salience, interference and response competition. These results combined with electrophysiological investigation of the function of neurons in the anterior cingulate cortex have provided insights that can be used in the improvement of cingulotomy performed on patients treated for OCD. The basis behind this idea is the fact that a variation of certain tasks, Emotional Stroop tasks (ES), which have been particularly identified as exerting effects in OCD patients activate neurons in the more rostral part of the anterior cingulate cortex. Thus, theoretically if bilateral cingulotomy is performed in such patient in the rostral anterior cingulate cortex, better results should be obtained.
Self-referential encoding
Medial prefrontal cortex (mPFC) activation occurs during processing of self-relevant information. When self-referent judgment is more relatable and less negative, the mFPC is activated. Finding support clear cut circuits that have high levels of activation when cognitive and emotional aspects of self-reflection are present. The caudate nucleus has not been associated with self-reference before, however, Fossati and colleagues found activity while participants were retrieving self-relevant trait adjectives. The ventral anterior cingulate cortex (vACC) is also a part of the brain that becomes activated when there are signs of self-referencing and processing. The vACC is activated when self-descriptive information is negative. There is also pCC (posterior cingulate cortex) activity seen in neuroimaging studies during self-referential processing.