Right but not left hemispheric discrimination of faces in infancy

The ontogeny of the functional asymmetries of the human brain is poorly understood. Are they a consequence of differential development based on competition mechanisms, or are they constitutive of the human brain architecture from the start? Using structural magnetic resonance imaging and a face-disc...

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Bibliographic Details
Published in:Nature human behaviour 2018-01, Vol.2 (1), p.67-79
Main Authors: Adibpour, Parvaneh, Dubois, Jessica, Dehaene-Lambertz, Ghislaine
Format: Article
Language:English
Subjects:
Brain
Cognitive science
Cortex
Discrimination
Electroencephalography
Face recognition
Fibre
Infancy
Infants
Lateralization
Magnetic resonance imaging
Neuroscience
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Summary:The ontogeny of the functional asymmetries of the human brain is poorly understood. Are they a consequence of differential development based on competition mechanisms, or are they constitutive of the human brain architecture from the start? Using structural magnetic resonance imaging and a face-discrimination electroencephalography paradigm with lateralized presentation of faces, we studied face perception in infants over the first postnatal semester. We showed that the corpus callosum is sufficiently mature to transfer visual information across hemispheres, but the inter-hemispheric transfer time of early visual responses is modulated by callosal fibre myelination. We also revealed that only the right hemisphere shows evidence of face discrimination when presented in the left visual hemifield. This capability improved throughout the first semester with no evidence of discrimination in the left hemisphere. Face-processing lateralization is thus a characteristic of the infant's extra-striate visual cortex, highlighting the differential left-right organization of the human brain already established in infanthood.
ISSN:2397-3374
2397-3374
DOI:10.1038/s41562-017-0249-4