PSYC3338 Chapter Notes - Chapter n/a: Dysmenorrhea, Second Epistle Of John
Document Summary
Post-surgery, still felt the limb but it wasn"t there. Even your body is something you construct in your mind. When derek shaved the left side of his face, he would feel tingling in the amputated hand. Ramachandran tested more with a q-tip on locations on derek"s face. This is a representation of the body on a map the face on the map is next to the hand. Neurons for the hand no longer get input, so they activate with adjacent input. The brain misinterprets the signals as coming from the hand instead of from the face. This shows a massive reorganization (brain plasticity!) post-amputation. Almost as if there has been a cross-wiring. Left side of the body is mapped onto the right side of the brain, just as the right side of the body is mapped onto the left side of the brain. Every point on body surface has corresponding point on body map.
