Congenital Face Blindness: Researchers Learn How The Health Problem Starts

For the first time, researchers have been able to determine the causes of congenital face blindness, which can be traced back to an early stage in the perceptual process.

Of course, the study authors point out how each face is unique and an essential part of a person's identity. However, the situation can be a bit different for those with congenital prosopagnosia or face blindness. This condition prevents an affected individual from using facial features to identify the person in front of them. Up until now, it was believed that facial blindness was associated with the later stages of the perceptual process, including converting facial information into abstract code and long-term storage.

In this recent study, researchers used MEG (magnetoencephalography) to measure the magnetic signature of cortical activity. "We were able to show that even the earliest face-selective responses, those recorded approximately 170 milliseconds after seeing a face, are altered in people with congenital prosopagnosia; we were also able to show that these changes are closely linked to their deficit in recognizing faces," said r. Andreas Lüschow, who heads the Cognitive Neurophysiology Working Group (AG Kognitive Neurophysiologie, Klinik für Neurologie mit Experimenteller Neurologie), in a news release.

Results showed that even life-long contact with other people does not enable affected persons to compensate for this face recognition deficit. This would suggest that the underlying neural mechanisms are divided into distinct, closed units, making it impossible for other areas of the brain to take over their function. 

More information regarding the study can be seen here.

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