What does it mean for a person's brain to be "split"?
When a person's brain is split it means that corpus callosum which connects 2 halves of the brain is cut off.
What was the reason why this procedure was performed on patients?
When someone suffered from epilepsy (kind of a storm in the brain), doctors used to cut off corpus callosum to prevent spreading of epilepsy to the other hemisphere.
Explain one of the tests Sperry and Gazzaniga performed on these split brain patients.
Their first patient was a soldier who had started having problems after a German soldier clocked him in the head with a rifle. After the operation Sperry and Gazzaniga ran an experiment in which this soldier was supposed to press a button whenever he saw an image. Researchers then flashed images of letters and other stimuli. For the stimuli delivered to the left hemisphere, the soldier simply pressed the button and said what he saw. It was different for the stimuli delivered to the right hemisphere. He couldn't verbally say what he saw but his left hand kept pressing the button every time an image appeared.
What were the results of this test?
Left hemisphere is dominant for verbal processing that's why the patient's answer matched the word. The right hemisphere cannot share information with the left, so he couldn't say what he saw but he was able to draw it or press the button.
What is the reason that these results occurred?
The reason is that the brain is divided into many parts and every part of the brain has its own function. Each of the parts works independently.
What is the corpus callosum and what role does it serve in your brain?
It's a flat bundle of neural fibers that connects the left hemisphere of the brain with the right. It facilitates communication between two hemispheres.
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