Visual Impairment and Cerebral Plasticity in the Human Brain

Abstract

Humans are able to analyze the world through information derived from various sensory modalities. After the loss of a given sense, anatomical, physiological and behavioral studies have shown that compensatory plastic changes take place in the cortex, first through the unmasking of synaptic contributions from other modalities, even in primary sensory areas. This fact underscores the metamodal theory of sensory cortical function and can be used to devise effective strategies to train the blind to compensate their loss through better use of the remaining sensory modalities.

Keywords

• blindness
• plasticity
• touch
• motor control
• audition