Various aspects of human cognition are shaped and enriched by abstract rules, which help to describe, link and classify discrete events and experiences into meaningful concepts. However, where and how these entities emerge in the primate brain and the neuronal mechanisms underlying them remain the subject of extensive research and debate. Evidence from imaging studies in humans and single-neuron recordings in monkeys suggests a pivotal role for the prefrontal cortex in the representation of abstract rules; however, behavioural studies in lesioned monkeys and data from neuropsychological examinations of patients with prefrontal damage indicate substantial functional dissociations and task dependency in the contribution of prefrontal cortical regions to rule-guided behaviour. This Review describes our current understanding of the dynamic emergence of abstract rules in primate cognition, and of the distributed neural network that supports abstract rule formation, maintenance, revision and task-dependent implementation.

抽象规则塑造和丰富了人类认知的各个方面，这些规则有助于将离散事件和经验描述、链接和分类为有意义的概念。然而，这些实体在灵长类大脑中出现的位置和方式以及它们背后的神经元机制仍然是广泛研究和辩论的主题。来自人类成像研究和猴子单神经元记录的证据表明，前额叶皮层在抽象规则的表示中起着关键作用；然而，对受损猴子的行为研究和来自前额叶损伤患者神经心理学检查的数据表明，前额叶皮层区域对规则引导行为的贡献存在显着的功能分离和任务依赖性。