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Years of Blindness Lead to “Visualize” Space Through Time

Spatial representation has been widely studied in early blindness, whereas research about late blindness is still limited. We recently demonstrated that the early (50–90 ms) event-related potential (ERP) response observed in sighted people during a spatial bisection task, is altered in early blind p...

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Autores principales: Amadeo, Maria Bianca, Campus, Claudio, Gori, Monica
Formato: Online Artículo Texto
Lenguaje:English
Publicado: Frontiers Media S.A. 2020
Materias:
Acceso en línea:https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC7418563/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/32848573
http://dx.doi.org/10.3389/fnins.2020.00812
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author Amadeo, Maria Bianca
Campus, Claudio
Gori, Monica
author_facet Amadeo, Maria Bianca
Campus, Claudio
Gori, Monica
author_sort Amadeo, Maria Bianca
collection PubMed
description Spatial representation has been widely studied in early blindness, whereas research about late blindness is still limited. We recently demonstrated that the early (50–90 ms) event-related potential (ERP) response observed in sighted people during a spatial bisection task, is altered in early blind people and is influenced by the amount of time spent without vision in late blind individuals. Specifically, in late blind people a shorter period of blindness is associated with strong contralateral activation in occipital cortex and good performance during the spatial task–similar to that of sighted people. In contrast, non-lateralized occipital activation and lower performance characterize late blind individuals who have experienced a longer period of blindness–similar to that of early blind people. However, the same early occipital response activated in sighted individuals by spatial cues has been found to be activated by temporal cues in early blind individuals. Here, we investigate whether a similar temporal attraction can explain the neural and behavioral changes observed after many years of blindness in late blind people. An EEG recording was taken during a spatial bisection task where coherent and conflicting spatio-temporal information was presented. In participants with long blindness duration, the early recruitment of both visual and auditory areas is sensitive to temporal instead of spatial coordinates. These findings highlight some limits of neuroplasticity. Perceptual advantages from cross-sensory calibration during development seem to be subsequently lost following years of visual deprivation. This result has important implications for clinical outcomes following late blindness, highlighting the importance of timing in intervention and rehabilitation programs that activate compensatory strategies soon after sensory loss.
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spelling pubmed-74185632020-08-25 Years of Blindness Lead to “Visualize” Space Through Time Amadeo, Maria Bianca Campus, Claudio Gori, Monica Front Neurosci Neuroscience Spatial representation has been widely studied in early blindness, whereas research about late blindness is still limited. We recently demonstrated that the early (50–90 ms) event-related potential (ERP) response observed in sighted people during a spatial bisection task, is altered in early blind people and is influenced by the amount of time spent without vision in late blind individuals. Specifically, in late blind people a shorter period of blindness is associated with strong contralateral activation in occipital cortex and good performance during the spatial task–similar to that of sighted people. In contrast, non-lateralized occipital activation and lower performance characterize late blind individuals who have experienced a longer period of blindness–similar to that of early blind people. However, the same early occipital response activated in sighted individuals by spatial cues has been found to be activated by temporal cues in early blind individuals. Here, we investigate whether a similar temporal attraction can explain the neural and behavioral changes observed after many years of blindness in late blind people. An EEG recording was taken during a spatial bisection task where coherent and conflicting spatio-temporal information was presented. In participants with long blindness duration, the early recruitment of both visual and auditory areas is sensitive to temporal instead of spatial coordinates. These findings highlight some limits of neuroplasticity. Perceptual advantages from cross-sensory calibration during development seem to be subsequently lost following years of visual deprivation. This result has important implications for clinical outcomes following late blindness, highlighting the importance of timing in intervention and rehabilitation programs that activate compensatory strategies soon after sensory loss. Frontiers Media S.A. 2020-08-04 /pmc/articles/PMC7418563/ /pubmed/32848573 http://dx.doi.org/10.3389/fnins.2020.00812 Text en Copyright © 2020 Amadeo, Campus and Gori. http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/ This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (CC BY). The use, distribution or reproduction in other forums is permitted, provided the original author(s) and the copyright owner(s) are credited and that the original publication in this journal is cited, in accordance with accepted academic practice. No use, distribution or reproduction is permitted which does not comply with these terms.
spellingShingle Neuroscience
Amadeo, Maria Bianca
Campus, Claudio
Gori, Monica
Years of Blindness Lead to “Visualize” Space Through Time
title Years of Blindness Lead to “Visualize” Space Through Time
title_full Years of Blindness Lead to “Visualize” Space Through Time
title_fullStr Years of Blindness Lead to “Visualize” Space Through Time
title_full_unstemmed Years of Blindness Lead to “Visualize” Space Through Time
title_short Years of Blindness Lead to “Visualize” Space Through Time
title_sort years of blindness lead to “visualize” space through time
topic Neuroscience
url https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC7418563/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/32848573
http://dx.doi.org/10.3389/fnins.2020.00812
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