Cognitive Visual Impairment And Blindness In Children

Imagine a situation where your entire personality is changed forever by an object that pierces an area of your brain. Those who have had a frontal lobotomy, whether purposefully or not, have had their personality changed permanently. An unlucky foreman of the Rutland Railroad, Phineas Gage, was on the receiving end of a tragic occurrence that severed the frontal lobe area of his prefrontal cortex. He underwent the experience of having a railroad spike pierce him beneath his left cheek and exit through his skull, consequently injuring an important area of his brain. This occurrence changed one part of Gage’s personality completely, though he seemed almost entirely functional after his accident. The one thing that changed in Gage was his ability to imagine the future. He lived completely present in the moment. The unique accident that affected Phineas Gage can be broken down with various different philosophical approaches to answer what is called the “mind-body problem”. The mind-body problem is composed of attempting to explain things like beliefs, consciousness, emotions, etc., in organisms. Physicalism, dualism, and functionalism all have their unique explanation for the mind-body problem’s implication of Phineas Gage’s accident.

I read the article, “Secrets of the Brain”, found in the February 2014 issue of National Geographic written by Carl Zimmer. I chose this subject because I have been fascinated with the brain and how it works. The research of the brain has been ongoing for many centuries now. The history in this article is interesting. It explained how scientists used to understand the brain and its inner workings. For example, “in the ancient world physicians believed that the brain was made of phlegm. Aristotle looked on it as a refrigerator, cooling of the fiery heart. From his time through the Renaissance, anatomists declared with great authority that our perceptions, emotions, reasoning, and actions were all the result of “animal spirits”—mysterious, unknowable vapors that swirled through cavities in our head and traveled through our bodies.” (Zimmer, p. 38)

The nineteenth century saw an explosion in knowledge regarding the brain unlike any before. For centuries, the brain had been considered the seat of human intelligence. However, the brain of the classics was a singular organ of

List at least three resources you should use to determine the visual and academic ability of a student with a visual impairment.

Many studies and experiments have been conducted to explain why change blindness occurs and in what situations is change blindness more likely to occur. Literature on change blindness is quite extensive, as it is an emerging area in psychology. A number of researchers have conducted experiments into the key areas where change blindness has been found to cause consequential outcomes. These areas include the effects of change blindness on eye witness testimonies, driving ability, and effects on autism. Literature on change blindness places an emphasis on methodology and this literature review will focus primarily on this. According to Simons & Levin (1998) change blindness is the phenomenon that occurs when a person fails to detect large changes between one viewed scene and another. Recent studies show similar findings and evidence as to the original literature into change blindness. As stated by Rensink, 2002 (as cited in Davies & Hone, 2007), change blindness has been the subject of intensive research in recent years beginning with studies in which researchers manipulated the content of abstract scenes.

Vision is a learned and developed skill as a child grows and connects parts of the brain to other parts of a child’s developing body. If a child has difficulty seeing the outside world they may not understand that there is a big interesting world to explore and discover. To explore is to learn new experiences and develop knowledge but without vision this may be delayed or has to be learnt in a different, slower way that can slow a child down academically. Without vision a child or young person may feel isolated and may not feel comfortable socially as they may not be able interpret someone’s mood or thoughts like a person with sight, because we sometimes use non-verbal forms of communication like facial expressions and body language to show

The most frequent diagnosis in dementia is Alzheimer’s disease. Alzheimer’s disease is defined as a progressive, degenerative, neurological disorder that is characterized by destroying memory and cognitive impairments. Dementia is estimated to affect 36 million people worldwide with 60 to 80% of cases consisting of patients specifically with Alzheimer’s disease dementia (Barnett, Leiws, Blackwell, Taylor, 2014).The age in determining whether a person is diagnosed with early or late-onset of Alzheimer’s disease is by the person’s age.

Part one of Oliver Sack’ book, “The Man Who Mistook His Wife for a Hat”, is about losses. The impairment or incapacity of neurological function of those who have loss or lack some of the functions of their brain. Neurological impairments that categorize with loss of functions are loss of vision, speech, language, memory, dexterity, and identity. Some of the diseases or dysfunctions that classify these impairments are Aphonia, Aphemia, Aphasia, Alexia, Apraxia, Agnosia, amnesia, and Ataxia (Sacks 3). It was Paul Broca in 1861 who began the study of the relationship between the brain and mind when a patient case had damaged to the left hemisphere of the brain resulting in aphasia, loss of speech. It was due to this to which it paved the way

Biological psychology is the study of how biology affects a number of psychological processes i.e. how the mind affects the body (Schacter, Gilbert, Wegner & Hood 2015). The study of the mind has had many influential figures throughout history that often use each other’s ideas as a stepping stone to further advance psychology, some of the first being Plato and Aristotle. Plato believed in nativism and theorised some skills and characteristics are innate and a person is born with them (Schacter et al, 2015). Aristotle, however, was in favour of philosophical empiricism i.e. that all knowledge is acquired through experience, yet current scientists do not consider that nativism and empiricism are entirely accurate (Schacter et al, 2015). Aristotle also believed that the brain existed to cool the blood, as during that time people were sceptical that an organ could be responsible for behaviour (Kolb, Whishaw & Teskey 2016). The next major advancement in biological psychology was the introduction of phrenology by Francis Gall, Gall’s theory suggested that all psychological capabilities had a specific place in the brain (Schacter et al, 2015). This theory later turned out to be correct, although was overshadowed by Gall’s insistence that he could state a person’s character dependant on the size of lumps and indentations on a person’s skull, which he thought would represent the size of that brain region beneath (Schacter et al, 2015). Due to this, in spite of a large following, phrenology was quickly discredited. Biologist Pierre Flourens, unhappy with Gall’s research, began removing localized areas of the brain in various animals to observe their behaviour (Schacter et al, 2015). Flourens then found that animal’s movements differed to those with intact brains. This mirrored a situation for surgeon Paul Broca with whom one of his patients had damage to the left side of

This, I led me too a love of psychology. How wonderful was it that there was a whole science devoted just to that one mystical organ? Studying the brain, we can unlock the doors to human

In the following essay an attempt will be made to look at the different perceptual disorders that can disrupt visual perception. Efforts will be made to compare (which by definition is the pointing out of differences and similarities) and it will also attempt to contrast (by pointing out the differences) in a logical and factual way. To do this, it is important to first define what is (a) meant by ‘Visual perception’ and what it is thought to (B)encompass, and the (c) different perceptual disorders that may consequently lead to a disruption in this visual perception. The following account will culminate in a factual recording of the effect these disorders may have on the individual and the resulting disruptions that may occur within visual perception.

In the video “A new way to heal hearts without surgery”, Franz Freudenthal discusses his discovery of a better technique for caring for patients with certain heart diseases by, essentially, designing a device to close holes in the heart without the need of surgery (Freudenthal). One of the eight ways of knowing essential to Freudenthal’s research is imagination. To imagine is forming an image or representation of something without the need of that object’s existence (Gendler). Freudenthal uses when he is inspired to both design and refine his device, which had never before existed.

Franz Joseph Gall created the first comprehensive theory of brain localization in 1796. Phrenology is a pseudoscientific theory that asserts an individual’s personality and mental capacities can be determined by the shape of their skull (Cooter, 1984). “Organology” was the original term that Gall used to describe his science; it was Gall’s follower, T.I.M Forster, who coined the term phrenology (Van Wyhe, 1999). Gall’s contemporary, Joseph Franz Spurzheim, was responsible for the dissemination of Gall’s ideas to the United Kingdom and the United States (Selby, 1993). Gall inspired many “egotistical” men to promulgate phrenology, and it “attracted such men because of its promise of superlative intellectual authority with minimal effort” (Van Wyhe, 1999). Phrenology

     One of the most complex and fascinating things in the human body is the brain. The body is “capable of almost everything, but it would not be possible, without the brain receiving information, and analyzing the information.”

Additionally, such students are not able to effectively use gestures (Fan & Cheung, 2005). Most of the developmental steps of such chilren are delayed due to lack of vison. In emotional context, they may feel helplessness while interacting with others. These children can develop congnitive impairment because they they lack the integrating experience of association and classification and the understaning of these experiences. The other challenge faced with such children to develop their vocabulary. Sighted children can easily acquire these skills by reading, watching facial expressions and movements, but visually impaired children are unable to expereince this and it hinders their capability to improve their vocabulary. Physically, a visually impaired student is constantly rubbing their eyes and is always blinking. Frowning, squinting and holding books at close range are other characteristics of visually impaired individuals. Lastly, visually impaired learners are constantly complaining of dizziness, nausea, itchy eyes as well as blurred vision (Fan & Cheung, 2005).