When people – and monkeys – look at faces, a special part of
their brain that is about the size of a blueberry “lights up.” Now, the most
detailed brain-mapping study of the area yet conducted has confirmed that it
isn’t limited to processing faces, as some experts have maintained, but instead
serves as a general center of expertise for visual recognition.
Neuroscientists previously established that this region,
which is called the fusiform face area (FFA) and is located in the temporal
lobe, is responsible for a particularly effective form of visual recognition.
But there has been an ongoing debate about whether this area is hard-wired to
recognize faces because of their importance to us or if it is a more general
mechanism that allows us to rapidly recognize objects that we work with
extensively.