Tactile Abilities

The purpose of this study was to see if a person is able to function normally when the left and right hemispheres of the brain are separated and can no longer communicate. To test this Gazzaniga and Sperry had run different experiments to test the visual, tactile, and auditory abilities of split-brain patients who had surgically severed the corpus callosum which allowed for the two hemispheres of the brain to communicate. To test their visual abilities patients had sat in front of a board with a row of lights on it that ran across it horizontally. The lights then lit up across both visual fields while the patient stared at a point in the middle of the board. When the “patients were asked to explain what they saw, they said that only the lights on the right side
To test the patients tactile abilities, objects were placed in patient’s right and left hands, out of their sight, and they were asked to identify the object. Patients were able to name and describe an object when it was placed in their right hand. However, when placed in their left hand, they could not name or describe the object in any way but they were still able to match the object in their hand when various objects were presented to them. To test patients’ visual and tactile skills, a picture was presented to the right hemisphere only, when this happened patients were unable to name and describe it. However, if they reached under the screen with their left hand and touch various objects they could find the object that matched or related to the picture. Another test that was ran was the word HEART was presented to the patients, with HE in the left visual field and ART in the right. They were then asked what they saw and patients had responded that they saw ART. However, when given two cards with the words HE and ART, patients pointed to HE claiming that is what they