He can tell which master craftsman blew a Venetian vase, but he can not name the Pope: a patient with a selective difficulty in naming faces.
A patient with damage to the left fronto-temporal region could not name faces, although his recognition and semantic knowledge of people were found to be intact. At variance with described anomics for persons' names, this patient was able to retrieve on definition names of people whose faces he could not name. When, instead, objects were to be named with a person's name, as in the case of manufacturers of Murano glass, the patient, a Murano glass master, was perfect. That is, he could tell which master craftsman in the famous Venini glass-works in Venice had blown a vase, but he could not identify the Pope from a picture. Naming faces is therefore shown to be independent of naming objects.
Semenza
Carlo
C
Department of Psychology, University of Trieste and Padova, Via Venezia, 6, 1-35100 Padova, Italy.
Sartori
Giuseppe
G
D'Andrea
Jessica
J
D006801:Humans; D020547:Lateral Ventricles / Q000473:pathology*; D008279:Magnetic Resonance Imaging / Q000379:methods; D008297:Male; D008875:Middle Aged; D010775:Photic Stimulation / Q000379:methods; D020238:Prosopagnosia / Q000473:pathology*; D021641:Recognition, Psychology / Q000502:physiology