What is the cerebrum responsible for?

• A. Balance and coordination
• B. Memory only
• C. Voluntary muscular activity, vision, speech, taste, hearing, thought, and memory.
• D. Automatic breathing

Answer: (C)

The cerebrum handles conscious thought and voluntary actions, integrating sensory information and enabling language, memory, and planning. The description that includes voluntary muscular activity, vision, speech, taste, hearing, thought, and memory captures its broad role: it contains motor areas that initiate movement, sensory areas for sight, hearing, and taste, and higher-order regions involved in thinking and remembering. Other brain parts handle things the cerebrum doesn’t primarily control: balance and coordination come mainly from the cerebellum, while automatic breathing is regulated by the brainstem. So this broad range of functions best reflects what the cerebrum does.