• Question: How do people adapt to losing a sense- e.g. sight?

    Asked by TamsinRL to Andy, James, Mary Jane, Wil on 15 Mar 2017.
    • Photo: Mary Jane Spiller

      Mary Jane Spiller answered on 15 Mar 2017:


      That’s a really good question – sometimes people become better in their other senses, so if someone loses their sight their hearing or sense of touch might get better (over time). And this also causes changes in the brain.
      There’s a really cool study where someone was blindfolded for 5 days, and in just 5 days there were changes to their brain caused by wearing a blindfold, and within hours of taking the blindfold off the brain had returned to normal. It shows how quickly our brains can adapt to changes in our senses.

    • Photo: Wilhelmiina Toivo

      Wilhelmiina Toivo answered on 15 Mar 2017:


      Human brain is really good at adapting! When you lose a sense, your other senses start taking over parts of the brain areas that would otherwise belong to that sense. It’s quite amazing, but obviously it takes some time 🙂 also while your brain might adapt well and without problems, being able to adapt psychologically and accepting the situation can be more difficult.

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