Face recognition in children with early right or left brain damage.

Development of face processing after unilateral brain lesions sustained before one year of age was assessed in children aged between seven and 10 years by various tasks involving face processing. Each child was paired with an age- and IQ-matched control. There were three unilateral right-hemisphere lesions and three unilateral left lesions. The results showed that some of the skills relative to face processing were preserved (or recovered?), whereas other skills were severely impaired; the pattern varied from one child to another. The existence of these dissociations shows that preservation of low-level visual processing together with exposure to the appropriate stimuli for several years is by no means sufficient for face processing skills to develop normally.