Tactile perception of blind and sighted persons

在盲人的大脑中观察到两种有趣的变化——被称为神经可塑性。在盲人盲文读者中，大脑触觉部分的很大一部分专门用于处理盲文阅读指尖的信息。更值得注意的是，盲人大脑皮层的正常视觉区域对触摸产生了反应。这个提议的目的是确定盲人大脑的这两种特征（如果有的话）对感知的影响是什么。盲人的触觉会因为这两种变化中的一种或两种而增强吗？该提案将通过测试盲人盲文读者、非盲文读者和视力正常的对照组，来解决这个问题，测试涉及到对纹理和振动感知的不同触觉任务。在执行这些任务的过程中，一些参与者的脑电活动也将被监测。

Two interesting types of changes -- known as neuroplasticity -- are observed in the brains of blind people.  In blind Braille readers, an unusually large portion of the tactile part of the brain is devoted to processing information from the Braille reading fingertip.  Even more remarkably, the normally visual areas of the cerebral cortex become responsive to touch in blind persons.  The purpose of this proposal is to determine what, if any, are the perceptual consequences of these two features of the brains of blind people.  Do blind people have a heightened sense of touch due to either or both of these changes?  The proposal will address this question by testing blind Braille readers, nonreaders, and a sighted comparison group on different tactile tasks involving the perception of textures and of vibrations.  Electroencephalagraphic brain activity will also be monitored during the performance of these tasks in some of the participants.