There is a general perception that people who have lost their sight seem to have heightened sensitivity in other senses, such as touch.
This was thoroughly investigated by a team of neuroscientists in Canada.
The study examined the sensitivity of detecting subtle movement through the fingers in two groups. The first group consisted of individuals with varying degrees of visual impairment.
From the analysis of the data, it was evident that the group with impaired vision exhibited increased sensitivity to touch, allowing researchers to provide concrete evidence that the brain uses touch compensatorily to make up for information lost from vision. The same may be true for other sensory pathways.
It also appears that the degree to which one sensation is enhanced relative to the weaker one is proportional to the degree of attenuation and the time at which that attenuation began to occur.
For this reason, the study results showed a significantly heightened sense of touch in the subgroup consisting of people who were blind from birth.
Scientists concluded that these individuals must have developed this ability in order to enrich their «picture» of the world!
