title: Haptic recognition of two-dimensional raised-line patterns by early-blind, late-blind, and blindfolded sighted adults.
abstract: We investigated the role of visual experience and visual imagery in the processing of two-dimensional (2-D) tactile patterns. The performance of early-blind (EB), late-blind (LB), and blindfolded sighted (S) adults in the recognition of 2-D raised-line patterns was compared. We also examined whether recognition of 2-D tactile patterns depends on the type of memory strategy (eg spatial, visuo-spatial, verbal, and kinesthetic) used by EB, LB, and S participants to perform the task. Significant between-group differences in the recognition performance have not been found despite significant between-group differences in self-reported memory strategies. Recognition performance does not vary significantly with the strategy, but correlates positively with visuo-spatial imagery abilities in the S participants. These findings may be taken to suggest that the difficulties some blind people experience with tactile pictures are not due to difficulties in processing 2-D tactile patterns.
authors.affiliation: Université Toulouse II--Le Mirail, Pavilion de la Recherche, Octogone-ECCD, 5 all6es Antonio Machado, 31058 Toulouse, France. delphine.picard@univ-tlse2.fr
authors.forename: Delphine
authors.initials: D
authors.lastname: Picard
authors.forename: Samuel
authors.initials: S
authors.lastname: Lebaz
authors.forename: Christophe
authors.initials: C
authors.lastname: Jouffrais
authors.forename: Catherine
authors.initials: C
authors.lastname: Monnier
mesh_terms: D000293:Adolescent; D000328:Adult; D001766:Blindness / Q000503:physiopathology*; D005260:Female; D005556:Form Perception; D006801:Humans; D008297:Male; D008875:Middle Aged; D010364:Pattern Recognition, Visual; D014110:Touch / Q000502:physiology*; D055815:Young Adult