Journal Article

PreJuSER-19852

http://join2-wiki.gsi.de/foswiki/pub/Main/Artwork/join2_logo100x88.png Many Faces of Expertise: Fusiform Face Area in Chess Experts and Novices

Bilalic, M. ; Langner, R.FZJ* ; Ulrich, R. ; Grodd, W.

2011
Soc. Washington, DC

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Please use a persistent id in citations: http://hdl.handle.net/2128/20576  doi:10.1523/JNEUROSCI.5727-10.2011

Abstract: The fusiform face area (FFA) is involved in face perception to such an extent that some claim it is a brain module for faces exclusively. The other possibility is that FFA is modulated by experience in individuation in any visual domain, not only faces. Here we test this latter FFA expertise hypothesis using the game of chess as a domain of investigation. We exploited the characteristic of chess, which features multiple objects forming meaningful spatial relations. In three experiments, we show that FFA activity is related to stimulus properties and not to chess skill directly. In all chess and non-chess tasks, experts' FFA was more activated than that of novices' only when they dealt with naturalistic full-board chess positions. When common spatial relationships formed by chess objects in chess positions were randomly disturbed, FFA was again differentially active only in experts, regardless of the actual task. Our experiments show that FFA contributes to the holistic processing of domain-specific multipart stimuli in chess experts. This suggests that FFA may not only mediate human expertise in face recognition but, supporting the expertise hypothesis, may mediate the automatic holistic processing of any highly familiar multipart visual input.

Keyword(s): Brain Mapping (MeSH) ; Face (MeSH) ; Humans (MeSH) ; Image Processing, Computer-Assisted (MeSH) ; Magnetic Resonance Imaging (MeSH) ; Male (MeSH) ; Neuropsychological Tests (MeSH) ; Orientation: physiology (MeSH) ; Pattern Recognition, Visual: physiology (MeSH) ; Reaction Time (MeSH) ; Temporal Lobe: physiology (MeSH) ; Visual Pathways: physiology (MeSH) ; Visual Perception: physiology (MeSH) ; J

Note: This work was supported by the Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft project GR 833/8-1 and BI 1450/1-2. We thank Michael Erb and Luca Turella for their insightful comments and help with the analysis. The help and cooperation from chess players is greatly appreciated.

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Contributing Institute(s):

1. Molekulare Organisation des Gehirns (INM-2)

Research Program(s):

1. Funktion und Dysfunktion des Nervensystems (FUEK409) (FUEK409)
2. 89571 - Connectivity and Activity (POF2-89571) (POF2-89571)

Appears in the scientific report 2011

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