Both lesion and functional imaging studies have implicated sectors of high-
order association cortices of the left temporal lobe in the retrieval of wo
rds for objects belonging to varied conceptual categories. In particular, t
he cortices located in the left temporal pole have been associated with nam
ing unique persons from faces. Because this neuroanatomical-behavioral asso
ciation might be related to either the specificity of the task (retrieving
a name at unique level) or to the possible preferential processing of faces
by anterior temporal cortices, we performed a PET imaging experiment to te
st the hypothesis that the effect is related to the specificity of the word
retrieval task. Normal subjects were asked to name at unique level entitie
s from two conceptual categories: famous landmarks and famous faces. In sup
port of the hypothesis, naming entities in both categories was associated w
ith increases in activity in the left temporal pole. No main effect of cate
gory (faces vs. landmarks /buildings) or interaction of task and category w
as found in the left temporal pole. Retrieving names for unique persons and
for names for unique landmarks activate the same brain region. These findi
ngs are consistent with the notion that activity in the left temporal pole
is Linked to the level of specificity of word retrieval rather than the con
ceptual class to which the stimulus belongs. (C) 2001 Wiley-Liss, Inc.