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Early ‘visual’ cortex activation correlates with superior verbal memory performance in the blind

Nature Neuroscience volume 6, pages 758–766 (2003)Cite this article

Abstract

The visual cortex may be more modifiable than previously considered. Using functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) in ten congenitally blind human participants, we found robust occipital activation during a verbal-memory task (in the absence of any sensory input), as well as during verb generation and Braille reading. We also found evidence for reorganization and specialization of the occipital cortex, along the anterior–posterior axis. Whereas anterior regions showed preference for Braille, posterior regions (including V1) showed preference for verbal-memory and verb generation (which both require memory of verbal material). No such occipital activation was found in sighted subjects. This difference between the groups was mirrored by superior performance of the blind in various verbal-memory tasks. Moreover, the magnitude of V1 activation during the verbal-memory condition was highly correlated with the blind individual's abilities in a variety of verbal-memory tests, suggesting that the additional occipital activation may have a functional role.

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Figure 1: Robust posterior occipital activation during verbal-memory, Braille and verb-generation tasks in the congenitally blind.
Figure 2: Differences in the fMRI activation patterns between blind and sighted groups.
Figure 3: Indication for a novel functional organization in the occipital cortex of the blind.
Figure 4: The preference of regions within the occipital cortex of the blind.
Figure 5: Comparing the activation pattern in three primary sensory regions.
Figure 6: The blind subjects' V1 activation during verbal-memory is correlated with their word recognition performance ∼6 months later.
Figure 7: The magnitude of calcarine activation in the blind is correlated with performance level in the standardized Wechsler verbal-memory tests.

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Acknowledgements

We thank M. Ahissar for pointing out the superior memory capabilities of the blind, A. Cohen, S. Hochstein, T. Orlov and G. Jacobson for insightful comments, M. Harel and T. Orlov for help with the 3D–cortex reconstruction, and M. Oved and M. Mattityahu from the learning center for the blind in the Hebrew University of Jerusalem. This study was funded by the Israel Science Foundation of the Israel Academy of Sciences (grant 8009). A.A. is funded by a fellowship from the Horowitz foundation.

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Author notes

  1. Amir Amedi and Noa Raz: These authors contributed equally to this work.

Authors and Affiliations

  1. Neurobiology Department, Life Science Institute, Hebrew University, Jerusalem, 91904, Israel

    Amir Amedi, Noa Raz & Ehud Zohary

  2. Interdisciplinary Center for Neural Computation, Hebrew University, Jerusalem, 91904, Israel

    Amir Amedi & Ehud Zohary

  3. Wohl Institute for Advanced Imaging, Tel-Aviv Sourasky Medical Center, Israel

    Pazit Pianka

  4. Department of Neurobiology, Weizmann Institute of Science, Rehovot, 76100, Israel

    Rafael Malach

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  1. Amir Amedi
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Correspondence to Amir Amedi.

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Supplementary information

Supplementary Fig. 1.

The laterality preference of voxels within the posterior occipital cortex for each of the tasks used in the experiment.White filled lines mark the approximate border between V1 and V2 while the dotted lines indicate the border between the retinotopic regions and the object related regions.The maps were computed by flipping the subjects ’ data images around the midline and contrasting the flipped and non-flipped images (after applying an 8mm FWHM spatial smoothing Gaussian).A paired t-test was then applied for each task to assess its laterality in each Talairach voxel. Voxels activated to the same extent in the right and left hemisphere will show the same activation in the flipped and non-flipped images and thus won ’t show any significant activation.Voxels showing significant left hemisphere dominance appear here in red to yellow colors,while voxels showing significant right dominance are depicted in blue to green colors.These laterality maps in the posterior occipital cortex demonstrate strong left hemisphere lateralization for the verbal memory and verb-generation condition, weaker left dominance for the Braille reading condition and a trend in the opposite direction for the auditory noise and sweep conditions.Note that only the left hemisphere is presented since the other hemisphere will simply show the symmetrical inverse pattern. (JPG 40 kb)

Supplementary Table 1 (PDF 19 kb)

Supplementary Table 2 (PDF 16 kb)

Supplementary Table 3 (PDF 16 kb)

Supplementary Table 4 (PDF 16 kb)

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Amedi, A., Raz, N., Pianka, P. et al. Early ‘visual’ cortex activation correlates with superior verbal memory performance in the blind. Nat Neurosci 6, 758–766 (2003). https://doi.org/10.1038/nn1072

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