A glimpse at vision: First impressions count
Wednesday, April 29, 2009 - 12:14
in Psychology & Sociology
Human beings far outpace computers in their ability to recognize faces and other objects, handling with ease variations in size, color, orientation, lighting conditions and other factors. But how our brains handle this visual processing isn't known in much detail. Researchers at Children's Hospital Boston, taking advantage of brain mapping in patients about to undergo surgery for epilepsy, demonstrate for the first time that the brain, at a very early processing stage, can recognize objects under a variety of conditions very rapidly. The findings were published in the journal Neuron on April 30th.