Processing information visually, the study goes on to say, when receiving it via touch is a skill that people blind since birth seem to have more aptitude for than those losing sight in later life.

        I hate it when the kids say it, but “duuuh.”

        We've been learning more about information processing for decades, and it was my interest in learning disabilities 20 years ago that made me begin to analyze my own approach to visual perceptions. I explain it to first-graders this way:

        Your eyes are like two little cameras, taking thousands of pictures of everything they see. Your eyes don't actually see those pictures; they simply transfer them into your brain, where the pictures are exposed and understood.

        My eyes don't work. Those particular cameras don't work. Instead, I get the pictures into the processing center through a variety of channels — ears, nose, feet and, primarily, my hands.

        The example of Braille for the Vanderbilt study seems a good one, since it was in thinking about my dependency on Braille that made me recognize the irony of my being a visual learner without physical benefit of sight.

        When I was in college, none of my textbooks was available in Braille. They were, however, available on tape. I would listen to those tapes and take voluminous notes, sometimes a word-for-word transcript, of the facts contained in those books. To assimilate, review and study that information, I read my notes.

        What was happening, in other words, was that I had to see the words to understand their meaning. In my particular case, I was only able to do that, to stimulate the visual cortex of my brain, by getting those words beneath my fingers.

        When I am shopping for a new jacket, I need to see what it looks like. For me, that means I put my hands on the jacket and, voila, an image occurs in my visual cortex detailing its cut, style, fabric, accessorizing pockets, trim and fasteners.

        Sometimes, someone will say to me “feel this one,” and something bristles in my brain. Part of this bristling is an aversion to being treated differently, of course. I live in the same world and use the same language as every other female on a similar shopping jaunt. But the bristling is also a reaction to inaccuracy: I may be feeling the texture of suede or wool or nylon, but I am seeing the overall jacket in my head.

        Helen Keller was said to have recognized all her friends by touching their faces. Well, I don't touch faces and don't happen to know any blind people who do these days, but the fact that she perfected that skill tells me that her visual cortex was in extremely good working order.

        One-third of the brain is believed to be taken up by visual processing. It makes sense that one whole third wouldn't be wasted by people who don't have benefit of useful vision. It also makes sense that stimulating visual areas of the brain through touch would be more difficult for people who have lived a long time with benefit of sight. Still, the ability is there for anyone to develop.

        Put an apple and an orange in a bowl before you. Close your eyes. You will have no difficulty determining which is the apple and which the orange by holding each in your hands; you will undoubtedly have a visual image in your brain of each fruit when you handle it.

        That's how it works. Like any skill, it can be taken to various levels, depending upon need and motivation. Naturally, “seeing” in this way is not nearly as rapid or efficient as seeing with those two little “eye cameras,” but it gets the job done.

        So the next time I say, “Nice to see you” or “Let me see that” I mean it pretty much the same way anyone else does. And the next time someone has a few million dollars to study blind people's brains, maybe they'll just talk to me. Contact Deborah Kendrick by phone: 673-4474; fax: 321-6430; e-mail: dkkendrick@earthlink.net.

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2002 Grammy nominees are the real thing - finally
Clark takes on the Grammys
DEMALINE: The arts
Former ballet star plans summer job
Harry Potter fan also collects cool comments
Jack Rosen, the 'marrying judge'
KENDRICK: Alive and well
Campbell's Scoop
MARTIN: Food stuff
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