the orbital and medial prefrontal cortex (PFC), involved in emotions and motivation; the dorsolateral PFC, involved in higher cognitive processes or “executive functions”; the premotor areas, involved in different aspects of motor planning; and motor cortex, involved in the execution of those plans. Although the striatum also receives input from other cortical areas, we focus on the frontal cortex because it receives the main basal ganglia output via the thalamus. Inputs from other cortical areas are also functionally organized, such that they overlap with frontal projections in the striatum, which are both functionally related and closely connected with specific frontal regions.19,68,69
