How Do Brain Injuries Change Personality?
Traumatic Brain Injuries:
The frontal lobes are considered our emotional control center and home to our personality. There is no other part of the brain where lesions can cause such a wide variety of symptoms (Kolb & Wishaw, 1990). The frontal lobes are involved in motor function, problem solving, spontaneity, memory, language, initiation, judgement, impulse control, and social and sexual behavior. The frontal lobes are extremely vulnerable to injury due to their location at the front of the cranium, proximity to the sphenoid wing and their large size.
Behavioral Problems of Traumatic Brain Injuries:
Behavioral problems of people with traumatic brain injury complicate recover. The list of behavioral dysfunction ranges from emotionally labile (mood swings), depression, and hyperactivity to aggression, sexual inappropriateness, and elopement (running away). Even lack of activity, or initation, can be a behavioral problem. In addition, psychological reactions to traumatic brain injury as well as predisposition to psychiatric abnormalities can be factors in behavorial complications.