Remission of lifelong episodic dyscontrol after bilateral dorsolateral temporal lobe damage.

A 45-year-old married woman with fits of episodic dyscontrol since an early age suffered a bilateral injury of the dorsolateral temporal lobe after which such episodes vanished for good. The remission of her lifelong proneness to aggression was so remarkable that her relatives and friends unanimously welcomed her "new personality". The post-traumatic taming in this case was an unanticipated collateral effect of brain damage with a salutary change of personality. This change possibly resulted from the release, due to the bitemporal injury, of inclinations that had not hitherto been fully expressed in the patient's mind and behavior due to the overriding influence of episodic dyscontrol on her ordinary conduct.