Deafness alters the spatial mapping of touch

Sharp, Andréanne; Landry, Simon P.; Maheu, Maxime; Champoux, François

doi:10.1371/journal.pone.0192993

Cited by 7 publications

(9 citation statements)

References 39 publications

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“…Together with previous evidence, the present results support the hypothesis that the lack of auditory input shifts the balance of the spatial reference frames towards the relatively external extreme end, i.e. more dependence on the body-centred than somatosensory coordinates in the previous crossed-arm TOJ tasks, 27 , 92 and more reliance on the allocentric world-centred than the egocentric body-centred coordinates in the present study ( Fig. 1A ).…”

Section: Discussionsupporting

confidence: 92%

“…Accordingly, since congenitally blind people do not manifest any crossed-hand effects, 97 it has been suggested that the lack of early visual input renders the touch localization in the early blind population mainly reliant on the internal somatosensory reference frame. More interestingly, compared with the normally developed hearing and sighted individuals, congenital deafness led to even larger impairments in the crossed-hand condition, 27 and even temporary auditory deprivation in normal-hearing individuals led to impairments in the crossed-hand condition. 92 Therefore, the lack of auditory input, even during temporal auditory deprivation, shifts the balance of spatial reference frames externally, leading to a heavier reliance on the relatively external body-centred frame of reference, compared with the relatively internal somatosensory frame of reference.…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 95%

“…Auditory deprivation, even temporary, disturbs a variety of multisensory processes, such as audio-visual integration involving speech elements 88 , 89 and audio-tactile integration during non-speech audio-tactile illusions. 90 , 91 Two recent studies investigated the effects of temporary auditory deprivation 92 and congenital deafness 27 on the spatial localization of touch, in a crossed-arm temporal order judgement (TOJ) task. 93 , 94 In the crossed-arm TOJ task, participants are asked to determine which of their two hands (left or right hand) received a tactile stimulus first, with their hands either uncrossed or crossed over the body midline.…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

“… 23–28 Accordingly, the lack of auditory experience in the deaf population can have a dramatic impact on these body-related processes. 19 , 27 , 29–38 An intact vision allows an individual to use the ‘parallel input’ attributes of the visual system to simultaneously capture spatial relationships between multiple external objects and their contextual background (i.e. allocentric spatial relationships).…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

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Impaired body-centred sensorimotor transformations in congenitally deaf people

Song

Wang

et al. 2022

Brain Communications

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Congenital deafness modifies an individual’s daily interaction with the environment and alters the fundamental perception of the external world. How congenital deafness shapes the interface between the internal and external worlds remains poorly understood. To interact efficiently with the external world, visuospatial representations of external target objects need to be effectively transformed into sensorimotor representations with reference to the body. Here, we tested the hypothesis that egocentric body-centered sensorimotor transformation is impaired in congenital deafness. Consistent with this hypothesis, we found that congenital deafness induced impairments in egocentric judgments needed to associate the external objects with the internal body. These impairments were due to deficient body-centered sensorimotor transformation per se, rather than the reduced fidelity of the visuospatial representations of the egocentric positions. At the neural level, we first replicated the previously well-documented critical involvement of the fronto-parietal network in egocentric processing, in both congenitally deaf participants and hearing controls. However, both the strength of neural activity and the intra-network connectivity within the fronto-parietal network alone could not account for egocentric performance variance. Instead, the inter-network connectivity between the task-positive fronto-parietal network and the task-negative default-mode network was significantly correlated with egocentric performance: the more cross-talking between them, the worse the egocentric judgment. Accordingly, the impaired egocentric performance in the deaf group was related to increased inter-network connectivity between the fronto-parietal network and the default-mode network and decreased intra-network connectivity within the default-mode network. The altered neural network dynamics in congenital deafness were observed for both evoked neural activity during egocentric processing and intrinsic neural activity during rest. Our findings thus not only demonstrate the optimal network configurations between the task-positive and -negative neural networks underlying coherent body-centered sensorimotor transformations but also unravel a critical cause (i.e., impaired body-centered sensorimotor transformation) of a variety of hitherto unexplained difficulties in sensory-guided movements the deaf population experiences in their daily life.

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Section: Discussionsupporting

confidence: 92%

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 95%

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

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Impaired body-centred sensorimotor transformations in congenitally deaf people

Song

Wang

et al. 2022

Brain Communications

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“…Moreover, none of the deaf participants in the study had acquired a signed language from birth, and only two learned one later in life. Sharp et al (2018) showed higher error rates in crossed vs. uncrossed arms conditions in a tactile TOJ task. They suggest that this is due to difficulties in integrating the conflicting visual and somatosensory information in the deaf group.…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 83%

Somatosensory processing in deaf and deafblind individuals: How does the brain adapt as a function of sensory and linguistic experience? A critical review

Villwock

Grin²

2022

Front. Psychol.

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How do deaf and deafblind individuals process touch? This question offers a unique model to understand the prospects and constraints of neural plasticity. Our brain constantly receives and processes signals from the environment and combines them into the most reliable information content. The nervous system adapts its functional and structural organization according to the input, and perceptual processing develops as a function of individual experience. However, there are still many unresolved questions regarding the deciding factors for these changes in deaf and deafblind individuals, and so far, findings are not consistent. To date, most studies have not taken the sensory and linguistic experiences of the included participants into account. As a result, the impact of sensory deprivation vs. language experience on somatosensory processing remains inconclusive. Even less is known about the impact of deafblindness on brain development. The resulting neural adaptations could be even more substantial, but no clear patterns have yet been identified. How do deafblind individuals process sensory input? Studies on deafblindness have mostly focused on single cases or groups of late-blind individuals. Importantly, the language backgrounds of deafblind communities are highly variable and include the usage of tactile languages. So far, this kind of linguistic experience and its consequences have not been considered in studies on basic perceptual functions. Here, we will provide a critical review of the literature, aiming at identifying determinants for neuroplasticity and gaps in our current knowledge of somatosensory processing in deaf and deafblind individuals.

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