Harvard Catalyst Profiles

Developmental prosopagnosia (DP), severe lifelong deficits in face recognition, is relatively prevalent (1-3% of population) and can create significant social difficulties as well as limit functioning at work. Though much has been learned about this disorder in the last 20 years, the underlying cognitive deficits, neural mechanisms, and best ways to treat this disorder remain to be characterized. In our current R01-funded project (R01 EY032510-02), we have been making strides towards understanding DP perceptual subtypes, finding that deficits in holistic face processing and eye discrimination ability may be particularly important dimensions. We are also characterizing the specific memory mechanisms deficient in DP (e.g., face recollection memory) and are currently testing a novel face memory training program, repetition lag training. Finally, we are using structural MRI, fMRI, DTI, and EEG to both understand the deficient neural mechanisms in DP and characterize neural changes related to successful treatment-related improvements. There are multiple potential roles of a student in this large and exciting project. First, they could get involved in the analysis of existing behavioral (perception/memory tests, clinical interview, etc) and neuroimaging data (fMRI, structural MRI, EEG, DTI). Second, they could help design new behavioral, fMRI, EEG, and eye-tracking tasks and administer these tasks to DPs. Third. they could perform clinical interviews, test DPs through the current behavioral battery, and coach them through our memory intervention. Any of these roles could readily result in being an author on a publication. Please reach out to me if you have any questions.