title: Synaesthetic perception of colour and visual space in a blind subject: an fMRI case study.
abstract: In spatial sequence synaesthesia (SSS) ordinal stimuli are perceived as arranged in peripersonal space. Using fMRI, we examined the neural bases of SSS and colour synaesthesia for spoken words in a late-blind synaesthete, JF. He reported days of the week and months of the year as both coloured and spatially ordered in peripersonal space; parts of the days and festivities of the year were spatially ordered but uncoloured. Words that denote time-units and triggered no concurrents were used in a control condition. Both conditions inducing SSS activated the occipito-parietal, infero-frontal and insular cortex. The colour area hOC4v was engaged when the synaesthetic experience included colour. These results confirm the continued recruitment of visual colour cortex in this late-blind synaesthetes. Synaesthesia also involved activation in inferior frontal cortex, which may be related to spatial memory and detection, and in the insula, which might contribute to audiovisual integration related to the processing of inducers and concurrents.
authors.affiliation: Institute of Experimental Psychology II, Heinrich-Heine University of Düsseldorf, Germany. Valentina.Niccolai@hhu.de
authors.forename: Valentina
authors.initials: V
authors.lastname: Niccolai
authors.forename: Tessa M
authors.initials: TM
authors.lastname: van Leeuwen
authors.forename: Colin
authors.initials: C
authors.lastname: Blakemore
authors.forename: Petra
authors.initials: P
authors.lastname: Stoerig
mesh_terms: D001766:Blindness / Q000503:physiopathology*; D001921:Brain / Q000503:physiopathology; D003118:Color Perception / Q000502:physiology*; D059907:Functional Neuroimaging; D006801:Humans; D008279:Magnetic Resonance Imaging; D008297:Male; D008875:Middle Aged; D010468:Perceptual Disorders / Q000503:physiopathology*; D010775:Photic Stimulation; D013028:Space Perception / Q000502:physiology*