Marshall J C, Halligan P W
Neuropsychology Unit, University Department of Clinical Neurology, Oxford, UK.
Nature. 1988;336(6201):766-7. doi: 10.1038/336766a0.
In a variety of neurological syndromes, patients may show tacit awareness of stimuli that cannot be consciously recollected or identified. Such dissociations are the defining characteristic of 'blindsight'; comparable phenomena are seen in some patients with amnesia and some with prosopagnosia, a profound impairment of familiar face recognition. We report here an analogous dissociation between overt and covert perception in a case of visuo-spatial neglect. The patient, P.S., had sustained right cerebral damage and failed overtly to process information in the hemispace contralateral to lesion. In common with most patients who manifest left-sided neglect, P.S. has a left homonymous hemianopia. Nonetheless, her neglect persists despite free movement of the head and eyes and is thus not a direct consequence of sensory loss in the left visual field. P.S. was presented simultaneously with two line drawings of a house, in one of which the left side was on fire. She judged that the drawings were identical; yet when asked to select which house she would prefer to live in, she reliably chose the house that was not burning.
在多种神经综合征中，患者可能会对无法有意识回忆或识别的刺激表现出隐性意识。这种分离是“盲视”的典型特征；在一些失忆症患者和一些面孔失认症（一种严重的熟悉面孔识别障碍）患者中也可见到类似现象。我们在此报告一例视觉空间忽视患者中显性和隐性感知之间的类似分离情况。患者P.S.右脑受损，无法显性地处理损伤对侧半空间中的信息。与大多数表现出左侧忽视的患者一样，P.S.患有左侧同向性偏盲。尽管如此，即使头部和眼睛可以自由移动，她的忽视仍然存在，因此并非左侧视野感觉丧失的直接后果。给P.S.同时呈现两张房屋的线条图，其中一张图的左侧着火了。她判断这两张图是一样的；然而，当被要求选择她更愿意居住的房屋时，她可靠地选择了没有着火的那所房子。
