The role of holistic face processing in acquired prosopagnosia: evidence from the composite face effect

ABSTRACT

Faces are processed more holistically than other objects, and it has been suggested that the loss of holistic face processing causes acquired prosopagnosia. Support for this hypothesis comes from several cases who failed to show holistic face effects as well as the absence of reports of prosopagnosics with unequivocally normal holistic face perception. The current study examines the relationship between holistic face processing and prosopagnosia by testing seven acquired prosopagnosics with the face composite task, a classic measure of holistic face processing. To enhance the robustness of the findings, each prosopagnosic was tested with two versions of the composite task showing upright faces. We also tested an inverted condition to exclude the possibility that more general factors account for composite effects for upright faces. Four of the seven acquired prosopagnosic participants showed consistent upright face composite effects with minimal inverted face composite effects. We conclude that severe face processing deficits can co-occur with intact holistic face processing and that factors other than a loss of holistic processing contribute to the perceptual and recognition deficits in acquired prosopagnosia.

KEYWORDS:

• Acquired prosopagnosia
• lesion patients
• face processing
• face perception
• holistic perception

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Correction to: The role of holistic face processing in acquired prosopagnosia: evidence from the composite face effect

Acknowledgments

We thank Faith, Florence, Galen, Herschel, Kepler, Kili, and Sandy for their interest and participation in this study. We also thank Constantin Rezlescu for his help with Testable.org.

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the authors.

ORCID

R. Dawn Finzi http://orcid.org/0000-0003-0636-7375

Additional information

Funding

This work was supported by a grant to BD from the National Science Foundation [grant number 1634098]. JB is supported by a Canada Research Chair and the Marianne Koerner Chair in Brain Diseases.