Functional neuroanatomy of developmental changes in face processing

描述(申请人提供)：人类一生中必须识别无数人脸的非凡能力多年来一直吸引着科学家的注意。即使是刚出生的婴儿也会盯着人的脸看。然而，成年人在记忆和辨别面孔方面似乎都比儿童更熟练，这表明面孔识别存在一定程度的可塑性，可能会受到经验的影响。面孔加工的一个方面似乎经历了发育变化，即感知面孔特征配置的细微差异，这是唯一识别一个人所不可或缺的属性。这种类型的处理随着年龄的增长而改善，并在青春期继续发展良好，而人脸识别的其他方面似乎发展得更早，甚至在婴儿期也是如此。以前的研究从行为的角度关注这些能力的发展，但很少有研究考察大脑基础遗忘识别机制。了解大脑在正常发育过程中的基本认知障碍对于理解为什么在一些发育障碍中大脑不会受到类似的面孔暴露的影响是至关重要的，例如自闭症或先天性面认失认症。在目前的方案中，功能磁共振成像(FMRI)将被用作一种脑成像工具来研究正常、健康的志愿者从6岁到成年的认知能力的发展。这项建议侧重于人脸识别的几个方面，以确定哪些机制随着年龄的增长而改善，哪些机制在发育过程中相对稳定。由于其非侵入性和最小的风险，功能磁共振成像是回答此类发育问题的理想选择。鉴于到目前为止，很少有研究这样做，这项提议的发现将对建立面部识别的大脑发育正常模式不可或缺。此外，功能磁共振成像可以揭示参与面孔加工的大脑区域之间的大规模功能连接模式，目前的提议将调查连接模式是否经历了发育重组。这条研究路线对于建立一个基线来解释人脸识别困难个体的大脑连接模式非常重要。最终，这样的数据可以为发展障碍的潜在治疗或干预提供信息，消除处理过程，并帮助这些人恢复社会行为的一个重要方面。

DESCRIPTION (provided by applicant): The remarkable capacity that humans have to recognize countless faces over a lifetime has captured the attention of scientists for years. Even newborn infants are tuned into and attend to the human face. However, adults appear to be more skilled than children in both remembering and differentiating faces, indicating that there is a certain degree of plasticity in face recognition that may be affected by experience. One aspect of face processing that appears to undergo developmental change is perceiving subtle differences in the configuration of the features of a face, a property that is integral to uniquely identifying a person. This type of processing improves with age and continues to develop well into adolescence whereas other aspects of face recognition appear to develop much earlier, even in infancy. Previous research has focused on the development of these capacities from a behavioral perspective, but little research has examined the brain bases efface recognition mechanisms. Understanding the brain basis efface recognition during normal development is of utmost importance in understanding why the brain is not influenced by similar exposure to faces in some developmental disorders, such as autism or congenital prosopagnosia. In the present proposal, functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) will be used as a brain imaging tool to study the development efface recognition capacities from age 6 to adulthood, in normal, healthy human volunteers. This proposal focuses on several aspects of face recognition to determine which mechanisms improve with age and which mechanisms are relatively stable across development. fMRI is ideal for answering such developmental questions due to its non-invasive nature and minimal risks. The findings from this proposal will be integral in establishing the normal pattern of brain development for face recognition, given that few studies have done so to date. Moreover, fMRI can reveal large-scale functional connectivity patterns among brain regions involved in face processing and the present proposal will investigate whether connectivity patterns undergo developmental reorganization. This line of inquiry is important for establishing a baseline to interpret brain connectivity patterns in individuals with difficulties in face recognition. Ultimately, such data can then inform potential treatments or interventions for developmental disorders efface processing and help restore an important aspect of social behavior to these individuals.