Welcome to the Social Perception Lab

Prosopagnosia Research Center
Department of Psychology and Brain Science, Dartmouth College

In a fleeting glance, we can identify a person, infer their emotional state, determine their gender, estimate their age, assess their attractiveness, and surmise the focus of their thoughts. Our group attempts to better understanding the neurocognitive mechanisms that allow us to perform these subtle tasks so effortlessly. Faces are the most valuable source of social information and much of our research involves faces, but we also carry out research on bodies and voices.

We study these processes in both neurologically-typical individuals and individuals with neuropsychological impairments. A major focus of the lab is on individuals with impairments that affect their ability to recognize faces, a condition called prosopagnosia. Evidence from prosopagnosia and other selective deficits helps us understand the nature of the mechanisms used for social perception, where they are located in the brain, how these mechanisms develop, and if training can improve their functioning.