Face-specific identification impairments following sight-providing treatment may be alleviated by an initial period of low visual acuity.

ABSTRACT: Identifying faces requires configural processing of visual information. We previously proposed that the poor visual acuity experienced by newborns in their first year of life lays the groundwork for such configural processing by forcing integration over larger spatial fields. This hypothesis predicts that children treated for congenital cataracts late in life will exhibit persistent impairments in face- but not object-identification, because they begin their visual journey with higher than newborn acuity. This would not be the case for patients whose pretreatment condition has allowed for initial low acuity vision, like that of a newborn. Here, we test this prediction by assessing the development of facial identification skill in three groups: patients treated for congenital cataracts whos

SUBMITTER: Gilad-Gutnick S 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC11286960 | biostudies-literature | 2024 Jul

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature