Differential engagement of anterior cingulate cortex subdivisions for cognitive and emotional function APRAJITA MOHANTY, a,b,c ANNA S. ENGELS, b,c JOHN D. HERRINGTON, b,c,d WENDY HELLER, b,c MOON-HO RINGO HO, e,f MARIE T. BANICH, g ANDREW G. WEBB, h STACIE L. WARREN, b,c and GREGORY A. MILLER b,c,i a Institute for Neuroscience and Cognitive Neurology and Alzheimer’s Disease Center, Northwestern University, Evanston, Illinois, USA b Beckman Institute Biomedical Imaging Center, University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, Urbana, Illinois, USA c Department of Psychology, University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, Urbana, Illinois, USA d Yale University School of Medicine, New Haven, Connecticut, USA e Department of Psychology, McGill University, Montreal, Quebec, Canada f Department of Psychology, Nanyang Technological University, Singapore g Department of Psychology and Institute of Cognitive Science, University of Colorado at Boulder, Boulder, Colorado, USA h Department of Bioengineering, Pennsylvania State University, University Park, Pennsylvania, USA i Department of Psychiatry, University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, Urbana, Illinois, USA Abstract Functional differentiation of dorsal (dACC) and rostral (rACC) anterior cingulate cortex for cognitive and emotional function has received considerable indirect support. Using fMRI, parallel tasks, and within-subject analysis, the present study directly tested the proposed specialization of ACC subdivisions. A Task  Region interaction confirmed more dACC activation during color-word distractors and more rACC activation during emotion-word distractors. Activity in ACC subdivisions differentially predicted behavioral performance. Connectivity with prefrontal and limbic regions also supported distinct dACC and rACC roles. Findings provide direct evidence for differential engagement of ACC subdivisions in cognitive and emotional processing and for differential functional connectivity in the imple- mentation of cognitive control and emotion regulation. Results point to an anatomical and functional continuum rather than segregated operations. Descriptors: fMRI, Anterior cingulate, Functional connectivity, Cognition, Emotion, Stroop In recent years neuroimaging data have often been interpreted as evidence for a fundamental, qualitative differentiation of cogni- tion and emotion, emphasizing that particular brain regions are specialized for either cognition or emotion and that this special- ization is anatomically segregated and often functionally recip- rocal (Drevets & Raichle, 1998). Although such a strict distinction between cognition and emotion is probably not vi- able (Miller, 1996), considerable data are compatible with the specialization of brain structures for cognitive versus emotional processing. Anterior cingulate cortex (ACC) is a prominent ex- ample of a brain region suggested as reflecting such a fraction- ation of cognitive and emotional processing. Based on indirect but impressive evidence from a variety of hemodynamic neuro- imaging studies, the ACC has been divided into ‘‘cognitive’’/ dorsal and ‘‘affective’’/rostral subdivisions (Bush, Luu, & Posner, 2000; Devinsky, Morrell, & Vogt, 1995). However, no direct statistical test of this specialization has been published. The logic of such a test is based on the concept of double dissociation. As implemented in functional brain specialization studies, if performance on task A is associated with increased neural activity in region X but not brain region Y, and if in addition performance on task B is associated with increased neural activity in region Yand not brain region X, then region X is specialized for task A and region Y is specialized for task B (Gray, Braver, & Raichle, 2002). Using the same group of par- ticipants, two studies reported activation of the ‘‘cognitive’’/dor- sal ACC during a nonemotional counting Stroop task (Bush This research was supported by the National Institute of Drug Abuse (R21 DA14111), the National Institute of Mental Health (R01 MH61358, T32 MH14257, T32 MH19554), and the University of Illi- nois Beckman Institute and Intercampus Research Initiative in Biotech- nology. Anna S. Engels was a predoctoral trainee in the Cognitive Psychophysiology training program of the Department of Psychology, University of Illinois at Urbana–Champaign, under NIMH Grant T32 MH19554. John D. Herrington was a predoctoral trainee in the Quan- titative Methods training program of the Department of Psychology, University of Illinois at Urbana–Champaign, under NIMH Grant T32 MH14257. The authors thank Emily Cahill, Nancy Dodge, Rebecca Levin, Sa- rah Sass, Brad Sutton, Holly Tracy, and Tracey Wszalek for their con- tributions to this project. Address reprint requests to: Gregory A. Miller, Department of Psy- chology, University of Illinois at Urbana–Champaign, 603 E. Daniel Street, Champaign, IL 61820, USA. E-mail: gamiller@uiuc.edu Psychophysiology, 44 (2007), 343–351. Blackwell Publishing Inc. Printed in the USA. Copyright r 2007 Society for Psychophysiological Research DOI: 10.1111/j.1469-8986.2007.00515.x 343