Evidence for a disturbance of the body schema in neglect.
Subjects with left neglect often fail to use and, in some instances, recognize the left side of the body. We performed a series of investigations to determine if this deficit is, at least in part, attributable to an impairment in the "body schema," an internal three-dimensional, dynamic representation of the spatial and biomechanical properties of one's body. First, subjects were shown a series of pictures of a single hand and asked to determine if the stimulus was a right or left hand. Subjects with neglect but not other subjects with brain lesions identified pictures of left (contra-lesional) hands significantly less reliably than pictures of right hands. On the basis of evidence demonstrating that the identification of pictured hands involves the matching of the stimuli to an on-line mental representation of one's body, these data suggest that neglect may be associated with a disruption of, or failure to attend to, the body schema. Data from subsequent investigations contrasting patients with left neglect and Gerstmann's syndrome argue for a distinction between a body schema and a "body image," or conceptual representation of the body which articulates with language.
Coslett
H B
HB
Department of Neurology, Temple University School of Medicine.
D000368:Aged; D000377:Agnosia / Q000175:diagnosis* / Q000209:etiology; D001828:Body Image; D002561:Cerebrovascular Disorders / Q000150:complications; D007839:Functional Laterality; D006801:Humans; D008875:Middle Aged; D009483:Neuropsychological Tests