Hi Folks,
Although this is off-topic, I saw this on another list and thought some
might be interested.
- Judi

Blind More Accurate at Judging Size Than Sighted.

Close your eyes and imagine a loaf of bread.  With your eyes still
closed, estimate with your hands the size of that loaf of bread.  Do you
think your  mental representation is an accurate one?  Specifically, how
accurately  have you gauged its size?  According to researchers from the
University of Otago  in New Zealand, you probably overestimated the size
of the bread.  That is, unless you are blind.

 Researchers Melissa Smith, Elizabeth A. Franz, Susan M. Joy, and
Kirsty Whitehead, of the University of Otago in New Zealand, found that
"blind  individuals were more accurate than sighted individuals in
representing the size of familiar objects."

Their findings are presented in the study, "Superior Performance of
Blind Compared with Sighted Individuals on Bimanual Estimations of
Object Size," in the January 2005 issue of Psychological Science, a
journal of the American Psychological Society.

 This research sought to examine the accuracy of memory representations
by instructing participants to imagine a set of familiar objects (e.g.,
a can of soda, a loaf of bread, a carton of eggs) and then demonstrate
the size of each object with their hands, without being able to see.
Participants included both sighted individuals (who closed their eyes
for the task) and blind individuals.

"Surprisingly, in over one hundred participants with normal vision, a
marked overestimation in object size was demonstrated, suggesting that
the visual-memory representations in sighted individuals might not be
accurate after all," Franz said. Meanwhile, blind participants showed no
overestimation and were more accurate in estimating object sizes.

 The researchers argue that in people who are blind, the memory of
familiar objects relies only on manual (not visual) representations that
are based on their experiences holding the actual objects. In sighted
individuals, however, memory of familiar objects relies on visual-memory
representations.  The authors believe visual representations may be
inaccurate in size because "sighted individuals see objects everyday in
different orientations and from different distances."

 Source URL:
 http://www.psychologicalscience.org/media/releases/2005/pr050328.cfm


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