In pioneering research, scientists from Dartmouth College teamed up with Claudio Vieira, a Brazilian who lives in Monte Santo, in the backlands of Bahia, and faces a rare condition known as Arthrogryposis Múltipla Congenita (AMC).
In this singular project, Claudinho — as he is affectionately known — became a key to unlocking the secrets of our brain when it's about identify human faces.
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His inspired story and collaboration with researchers have offered valuable insights into how our brains adapt to and process visual information in experimental situations.
Claudio faced several challenges, as he received a medical prognosis that gave him only 24 hours to live. He was born with atrophied legs, arms fused to his chest, and his head turned back at a 180° angle.
(Image: Reproduction/Personal Archive)
The scientific community was already aware that facial recognition became a more complex task when the face rotated 180°, but it raised an intriguing question about ableism.
The researchers wondered: Was this the result of evolutionary adaptations or simply because most of us interact with people in upright positions?
The study began in 2015 and continued until 2019, a period of four years in which the researchers meticulously evaluated Claudio's ability to detect and consider faces in positions inverted.
The results revealed something truly surprising: Claudio demonstrated remarkable precision when handling with the detection of inverted faces and when making judgments related to the “Thatcher effect” (face inverted).
An interesting finding was that, when it came to facial identification, as happened with Cláudio, this was similar to individuals in the control group.
This is something particularly intriguing, as it contrasts with the “Thatcher effect”, a phenomenon that occurs when it is difficult to perceive local changes in a face, if it is in head down.
On the other hand, these same changes would be obvious when the face was in its usual upright position.
The study suggests that our ability to consider faces in an upright position is a complex interplay between evolutionary mechanisms and experience.
Claudio, due to his extensive experience with upright faces, did not demonstrate an ability superior at noticing inverted faces compared to its ability to detect faces in the vertical.
This highlights the importance of experience in our facial recognition capabilities, shaped by the way we interact with people in everyday environments.
However, scientists confirm that there is still much to explore and understand about the differences between facial recognition in upright and inverted positions.
As well as other aspects of facial judgment, including expressions, age, gender, attractiveness, gaze direction and trustworthiness.
The study offers enhanced insight into one specific aspect of facial perception, but there's a whole world of nuances to how our brains apparently process information.
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