Developmental Prosopagnosia Essay

Developmental prosopagnosia (DP) is the inability to recognize faces (Biotti & Cook, 2016). DP can affect one in every 50 individuals, both men and women (Biotti & Cook, 2016). DP is caused in the temporal lobe in a specific area known as the fusiform face area. The fusiform face area is the ability for an individual’s brain to be able to help recognize different faces (Biotti & Cook, 2016). One thing that is interesting about this topic is, a person with DP is not able to recognize faces but they can recognize the color a person has on and facial emotions. For example, a video from YouTube, was shown to the class based on a woman named Terry, who has prosopagnosia. Terry was presented four pictures of different people and the women doing the study asked her to find the picture that was her mother. Terry was unable to recognize her mother’s face when it was presented to her even though she was just taking pictures of her mother. The lady who was given the study, then showed the color of the shirt that everyone had on in the picture. Terry, who had prosopagnosia then could recognize her mother by the color of shirt she …show more content…
Botti and Cook (2016), conducted an experiment with 23 participants who have developmental prosopagnosia. Beth and Cook (2016) performed this experiment to see if those with DP could label the emotions and expressions that were linked to everyone shown to them. Some of the expressions and emotions shown were sad face, happy face, and surprise face (Botti & Cook, 2016). The participants were introduced 21 facial expressions at 20 different times in random order (Botti & Cook, 2016). The participants were given this experiment on a computer and the results were found by using ANOVA (Botti & Cook, 2016). The results showed that an individual who has DP can recognize different emotions and expressions presented on a person’s face easier if it is a happy or sad face compared to fear (Botti & Cook,