Riddoch M Jane, Johnston Robert A, Bracewell R Martyn, Boutsen Luc, Humphreys Glyn W
Behavioural Brain Sciences, School of Psychology, University of Birmingham, Birmingham, UK.
Cogn Neuropsychol. 2008 Feb;25(1):3-26. doi: 10.1080/02643290801920113.
The ability to recognize individual faces is of crucial social importance for humans and evolutionarily necessary for survival. Consequently, faces may be "special" stimuli, for which we have developed unique modular perceptual and recognition processes. Some of the strongest evidence for face processing being modular comes from cases of prosopagnosia, where patients are unable to recognize faces whilst retaining the ability to recognize other objects. Here we present the case of an acquired prosopagnosic whose poor recognition was linked to a perceptual impairment in face processing. Despite this, she had intact object recognition, even at a subordinate level. She also showed a normal ability to learn and to generalize learning of nonfacial exemplars differing in the nature and arrangement of their parts, along with impaired learning and generalization of facial exemplars. The case provides evidence for modular perceptual processes for faces.
识别个体面孔的能力对人类具有至关重要的社会意义，并且从进化角度来看对生存也是必不可少的。因此，面孔可能是“特殊”的刺激物，针对此类刺激我们已经发展出了独特的模块化感知和识别过程。面孔加工具有模块化这一观点的一些最有力证据来自面孔失认症患者，这些患者无法识别面孔，但仍保留识别其他物体的能力。在此，我们报告一例后天性面孔失认症患者，其面孔识别能力差与面孔加工中的感知障碍有关。尽管如此，她的物体识别能力完好无损，甚至在从属水平上也是如此。她还表现出正常的学习能力，能够对在部分性质和排列上不同的非面部范例进行学习和泛化，而对面部范例的学习和泛化则受损。该病例为面孔的模块化感知过程提供了证据。
