Early Category-Specific Cortical Activation Revealed by Visual Stimulus Inversion

Visual categorization may already start within the first 100-ms after stimulus onset, in contrast with the long-held view that during this early stage all complex stimuli are processed equally and that category-specific cortical activation occurs only at later stages. The neural basis of this proposed early stage of high-level analysis is however poorly understood. To address this question we used magnetoencephalography and anatomically-constrained distributed source modeling to monitor brain activity with millisecond-resolution while subjects performed an orientation task on the upright and upside-down presented images of three different stimulus categories: faces, houses and bodies. Significant inversion effects were found for all three stimulus categories between 70–100-ms after picture onset with a highly category-specific cortical distribution. Differential responses between upright and inverted faces were found in well-established face-selective areas of the inferior occipital cortex and right fusiform gyrus. In addition, early category-specific inversion effects were found well beyond visual areas. Our results provide the first direct evidence that category-specific processing in high-level category-sensitive cortical areas already takes place within the first 100-ms of visual processing, significantly earlier than previously thought, and suggests the existence of fast category-specific neocortical routes in the human brain.     

Comparing neural correlates of configural processing in faces and objects: an ERP study of the Thatcher illusion

In the Thatcher illusion, a face with inverted eyes and mouth looks abnormal when upright but not when inverted. Behavioral studies have shown that thatcherization of an upright face disrupts perceptual processing of the local configuration. We recorded high-density EEG from normal observers to study ERP correlates of the illusion during the perception of faces and nonface objects, to determine whether inversion and thatcherization affect similar neural mechanisms. Observers viewed faces and houses in four conditions (upright vs. inverted, and normal vs. thatcherized) while detecting an oddball category (chairs). Thatcherization delayed the N170 component over occipito-temporal cortex to faces, but not to houses. This modulation matched the illusion as it was larger for upright than inverted faces. The P1 over medial occipital regions was delayed by face inversion but unaffected by thatcherization. Finally, face thatcherization delayed P2 over occipito-temporal but not over parietal regions, while inversion affected P2 across categories. All effects involving thatcherization were face-specific. These results indicate that effects of face inversion and feature inversion (in thatcherized faces) can be distinguished on a functional as well as neural level, and that they affect configural processing of faces in different time windows.     

Electrophysiological neural mechanisms for detection, configural analysis and recognition of faces

Despite ample explorations the nature of neural mechanisms underlying human expertise in face perception is still undetermined. Here we examined the response of two electrophysiological signals, the N170 ERP and induced gamma-band activity (>20 Hz), to face orientation and familiarity across two blocks, one in which the face identity was task-relevant and one in which it was not. N170 amplitude to inverted faces was higher than to upright faces and was not influenced by face familiarity or its task relevancy. In contrast, induced gamma activity was higher for upright than for inverted faces and for familiar than unfamiliar faces. The effect of face inversion was found in lower gamma frequency band (25-50 Hz), whereas familiarity affected amplitudes in higher gamma frequency band (50-70 Hz). For gamma, the relevance of face identity to the task modulated both inversion and familiarity effects. These findings pinpoint three functionally dissociated neural mechanisms involved in face processing, namely, detection, configural analysis, and recognition.     

Neural responses to Mooney images reveal a modular representation of faces in human visual cortex

The way in which information about objects is represented in visual cortex remains controversial. One model of human object recognition poses that information is processed in modules, highly specialised for different categories of objects; an opposing model appeals to a distributed representation across a large network of visual areas. We addressed this debate by monitoring activity in face- and object-selective areas while human subjects viewed ambiguous face stimuli (Mooney faces). The measured neural response in the face-selective region of the fusiform gyrus was greater when subjects reported seeing a face than when they perceived the image as a collection of blobs. In contrast, there was no difference in magnetic resonance response between face and no-face perceived events in either the face-selective voxels of the superior temporal sulcus or the object-selective voxels of the parahippocampal gyrus and lateral occipital complex. These results challenge the concept that neural representation of faces is distributed and overlapping and suggest that the fusiform gyrus is tightly linked to the awareness of faces.     

The functionally defined right occipital and fusiform "face areas" discriminate novel from visually familiar faces

Neuroimaging (PET and fMRI) studies have identified a set of brain areas responding more to faces than to other object categories in the visual extrastriate cortex of humans. This network includes the middle lateral fusiform gyrus (the fusiform face area, or FFA) as well as the inferior occipital gyrus (occipital face area, OFA). The exact functions of these areas in face processing remain unclear although it has been argued that their primary function is to distinguish faces from nonface object categories-"face detection"-or also to discriminate among faces, irrespective of their visual familiarity to the observer. Here, we combined the data from two previous positron emission tomography (PET) studies to show that the functionally defined face areas are involved in the automatic discrimination between unfamiliar faces and familiar faces. Consistent with previous studies, a face localizer contrast (faces-objects) revealed bilateral activation in the middle lateral fusiform gyrus (FFA, BA37) and in the right inferior occipital cortex (OFA, BA19). Within all the regions of the right hemisphere, larger levels of activation were found for unfamiliar as compared to familiar faces. These results suggest that the very same areas involved in categorizing faces at the basic or individual level, play a role in differentiating familiar faces from new faces, showing an overlap between visual and presemantic mnesic representations of faces in the right hemisphere.     

Covert face recognition without the fusiform-temporal pathways

Patients with prosopagnosia are unable to recognize faces consciously, but when tested indirectly they can reveal residual identification abilities. The neural circuitry underlying this covert recognition is still unknown. One candidate for this function is the partial survival of a pathway linking the fusiform face area (FFA) and anterior-inferior temporal (AIT) cortex, which has been shown to be essential for conscious face identification. Here we performed functional magnetic, and diffusion tensor imaging in FE, a patient with severe prosopagnosia, with the goal of identifying the neural substrates of his robust covert face recognition. FE presented massive bilateral lesions in the fusiform gyri that eliminated both FFAs, and also disrupted the fibers within the inferior longitudinal fasciculi that link the visual areas with the AITs and medial temporal lobes. Therefore participation of the fusiform-temporal pathway in his covert recognition was precluded. However, face-selective activations were found bilaterally in his occipital gyri and in his extended face system (posterior cingulate and orbitofrontal areas), the latter with larger responses for previously-known faces than for faces of strangers. In the right hemisphere, these surviving face selective-areas were connected via a partially persevered inferior fronto-occipital fasciculus. This suggests an alternative occipito-frontal pathway, absent from current models of face processing, that could explain the patient's covert recognition while also playing a role in unconscious processing during normal cognition.     

The roles of "face" and "non-face" areas during individual face perception: evidence by fMRI adaptation in a brain-damaged prosopagnosic patient

Two regions in the human occipito-temporal cortex respond preferentially to faces: 'the fusiform face area' ('FFA') and the 'occipital face area' ('OFA'). Whether these areas have a dominant or exclusive role in face perception, or if sub-maximal responses in other visual areas such as the lateral occipital complex (LOC) are also involved, is currently debated. To shed light on this issue, we tested normal participants and PS, a well-known brain-damaged patient presenting a face-selective perception deficit (prosopagnosia) [Rossion, B., Caldara, R., Seghier, M., Schuller, A. M., Lazeyras, F., Mayer, E. (2003). A network of occipito-temporal face-sensitive areas besides the right middle fusiform gyrus is necessary for normal face processing. Brain 126 2381-2395.], with functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI). Of particular interest, the right hemisphere lesion of the patient PS encompasses the 'OFA' but preserves the 'FFA' and LOC [Sorger, B., Goebel, R., Schiltz, C., Rossion, B. (2007). Understanding the functional neuroanatomy of acquired prosopagnosia. NeuroImage 35, 836-852.]. Using fMRI-adaptation, we found a dissociation between the coding of individual exemplars in the structurally intact 'FFA', which was impaired for faces but preserved for objects in the patient PS's brain. Most importantly, a larger response to different faces than repeated faces was found in the ventral part of the LOC both for normals and the patient, next to the right hemisphere lesion. Thus, following prosopagnosia, areas that do not respond preferentially to faces such as the ventral part of the LOC (vLOC) may still be recruited for compensatory or residual individual face perception. Overall, these observations indicate that several high-level visual areas in the human brain contribute to individual face perception. However, a subset of these areas in the right hemisphere, those responding preferentially to faces ('FFA' and 'OFA'), appear to be critical for this function.     

Neural activation to upright and inverted faces in infants measured by near infrared spectroscopy

The present study examined infants' brain activity in response to upright and inverted faces using near infrared spectroscopy (NIRS), which can non-invasively record hemodynamic changes of the brain. NIRS is particularly useful for recording in infants, since recordings can be made, even while the infants are awake, without fixing their body and brain. For this objective, we used newly developed sensor probes of NIRS for recording in infants. We measured changes in cerebral oxygenation in 10 5-8-month-olds' left and right lateral areas while they were looking at upright and inverted faces. The results are summarized as follows: (1) the concentration of oxyhemoglobin (oxy-Hb) and total hemoglobin (total-Hb) increased significantly in the right lateral area during the upright face condition, (2) the concentration of total-Hb in the right lateral area differed significantly between the upright and inverted conditions, (3) hemodynamic changes were maximal in the temporal region, probably in the superior temporal sulcus (STS) in both hemispheres, and (4) the right hemisphere seems to be more important for recognizing upright faces. This is the first evidence showing that there is an inter-hemispheric difference on the effect of face inversion in the infant brain using a hemodynamic method.     

Differential selectivity for dynamic versus static information in face-selective cortical regions

Neuroimaging studies have identified multiple face-selective regions in human cortex but the functional division of labor between these regions is not yet clear. A central hypothesis, with some empirical support, is that face-selective regions in the superior temporal sulcus (STS) are particularly responsive to dynamic information in faces, whereas the fusiform face area (FFA) computes the static or invariant properties of faces. Here we directly tested this hypothesis by measuring the magnitude of response in each region to both dynamic and static stimuli. Consistent with the hypothesis, we found that the response to movies of faces was not significantly different from the response to static images of faces from these same movies in the right FFA and right occipital face area (OFA). By contrast the face-selective region in the right posterior STS (pSTS) responded nearly three times as strongly to dynamic faces as to static faces, and a face-selective region in the right anterior STS (aSTS) responded to dynamic faces only. Both of these regions also responded more strongly to moving faces than to moving bodies, indicating that they are preferentially engaged in processing dynamic information from faces, not in more general processing of any dynamic social stimuli. The response to dynamic and static faces was not significantly different in a third face-selective region in the posterior continuation of the STS (pcSTS). The strong selectivity of face-selective regions in the pSTS and aSTS, but not the FFA, OFA or pcSTS, for dynamic face information demonstrates a clear functional dissociation between different face-selective regions, and provides further clues into their function.     

Distinct representations for facial identity and changeable aspects of faces in the human temporal lobe

The neural system underlying face perception must represent the unchanging features of a face that specify identity, as well as the changeable aspects of a face that facilitate social communication. However, the way information about faces is represented in the brain remains controversial. In this study, we used fMR adaptation (the reduction in fMRI activity that follows the repeated presentation of identical images) to ask how different face- and object-selective regions of visual cortex contribute to specific aspects of face perception. We report that activity in the face-selective region of the fusiform gyrus (FG) was reduced following repeated presentations of the same face. Adaptation in this area was not sensitive to changes in image size, but was sensitive to changes in viewpoint. In contrast, face-selective regions in the superior temporal lobe failed to adapt to identical presentations of the same face, but showed an increased response when the same face was shown from different viewpoints and with different expressions. These results reveal a largely size-invariant neural representation in the inferior temporal lobe that could be involved in the recognition of facial identity, and a separate face-selective region in the superior temporal lobe that could be used to detect changeable aspects of faces. The absence of fMR-adaptation in object-selective regions of visual cortex challenges the idea that a more distributed network of areas is used to represent information about faces.     

Sex differences in the neural correlates of child facial resemblance: an event-related fMRI study

Detection of genetic relatedness (i.e. kinship) impacts the social, parental, and sexual behavior of many species. In humans, self-referent phenotype matching based on facial resemblance may indicate kinship. For example, faces that resemble ours are perceived as more trustworthy and attractive. Sex differences in behavioral reactions to facial resemblance among children have also been demonstrated and are consistent with evolutionary theory suggesting that resemblance might serve as a paternity cue. Using event-related fMRI, we show that specific regions of the brain are implicated in processing facial resemblance and a sex difference in cortical response to facial resemblance expressed in children. We found a consistent activation in the fusiform gyrus across all face conditions, which is consistent with previous research on face processing. There were no sex differences in overall response to faces in the fusiform gyrus, and also to faces that did not resemble subjects. When resemblance was not modeled, females showed greater activation to child faces than males. Consistent with parental investment theory and theories of sexual selection, males showed greater cortical activity than females in response to children's faces that resembled them. These data suggest natural selection may have crafted a sexually differentiated neuro-sensory module implicated in detection of facial resemblance that may serve as a kin detection and paternity cue. This process may capitalize on neural substrates involved in self-referent processing and familiarity detection.     

Early electrophysiological responses to multiple face orientations correlate with individual discrimination performance in humans

Picture-plane inversion dramatically impairs face recognition. Behavioral and event-related potential (ERP) studies suggest that this effect takes place during perceptual encoding of the face stimulus. However, the relationship between early electrophysiological responses to upright and inverted faces and the behavioral face inversion effect remains unclear. To address this question, we recorded ERPs while presenting 10 subjects with face photographs at 12 different orientations around the clock (30 degrees steps) during an individual face matching task. Using the variability in the electrophysiological responses introduced by the multiple orientations of the target face, we found a correlation between the ERP signal at 130-170 ms on occipito-temporal channels, and the behavioral performance measured on the probe stimulus. Correlations between ERP signal and behavioral performance started about 10 ms earlier in the right hemisphere. Significant effects of orientation were observed already at the level of the visual P1 (peaking at 100 ms), but the ERP signal was not correlated with behavior until the face-sensitive N170 time window. Overall, these observations indicate that plane-inversion affects the perceptual encoding of faces as early as 130 ms in occipito-temporal regions, leading directly to an increase in error rates and RTs during individual face recognition.     

Seeing John Malkovich: the neural substrates of person categorization

Neuroimaging data have implicated regions of the ventral temporal cortex (e.g., fusiform gyrus) as functionally important in face recognition. Recent evidence, however, suggests that these regions are not face-specific, but rather reflect subordinate-level categorical processing underpinned by perceptual expertise. Moreover, when people possess expertise for a particular class of stimuli (e.g., faces), subordinate-level identification is thought to be an automatic process. To investigate the neural substrates of person construal, we used functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) to contrast brain activity while participants judged faces at different levels of semantic specificity (i.e., identity vs. occupation). The results revealed that participants were quicker to access identity than occupational knowledge. In addition, greater activity was observed in bilateral regions of the fusiform gyrus on identity than occupation trials. Taken together, these findings support the viewpoint that person construal is characterized by the ability to access subordinate-level semantic information about people, a capacity that is underpinned by neural activity in discrete regions of the ventral temporal cortex.     

View-independent coding of face identity in frontal and temporal cortices is modulated by familiarity: an event-related fMRI study

Face recognition is a unique visual skill enabling us to recognize a large number of person identities, despite many differences in the visual image from one exposure to another due to changes in viewpoint, illumination, or simply passage of time. Previous familiarity with a face may facilitate recognition when visual changes are important. Using event-related fMRI in 13 healthy observers, we studied the brain systems involved in extracting face identity independent of modifications in visual appearance during a repetition priming paradigm in which two different photographs of the same face (either famous or unfamiliar) were repeated at varying delays. We found that functionally defined face-selective areas in the lateral fusiform cortex showed no repetition effects for faces across changes in image views, irrespective of pre-existing familiarity, suggesting that face representations formed in this region do not generalize across different visual images, even for well-known faces. Repetition of different but easily recognizable views of an unfamiliar face produced selective repetition decreases in a medial portion of the right fusiform gyrus, whereas distinct views of a famous face produced repetition decreases in left middle temporal and left inferior frontal cortex selectively, but no decreases in fusiform cortex. These findings reveal that different views of the same familiar face may not be integrated within a single representation at initial perceptual stages subserved by the fusiform face areas, but rather involve later processing stages where more abstract identity information is accessed.     

Decoding Face Information in Time, Frequency and Space from Direct Intracranial Recordings of the Human Brain

Faces are processed by a neural system with distributed anatomical components, but the roles of these components remain unclear. A dominant theory of face perception postulates independent representations of invariant aspects of faces (e.g., identity) in ventral temporal cortex including the fusiform gyrus, and changeable aspects of faces (e.g., emotion) in lateral temporal cortex including the superior temporal sulcus. Here we recorded neuronal activity directly from the cortical surface in 9 neurosurgical subjects undergoing epilepsy monitoring while they viewed static and dynamic facial expressions. Applying novel decoding analyses to the power spectrogram of electrocorticograms (ECoG) from over 100 contacts in ventral and lateral temporal cortex, we found better representation of both invariant and changeable aspects of faces in ventral than lateral temporal cortex. Critical information for discriminating faces from geometric patterns was carried by power modulations between 50 to 150 Hz. For both static and dynamic face stimuli, we obtained a higher decoding performance in ventral than lateral temporal cortex. For discriminating fearful from happy expressions, critical information was carried by power modulation between 60–150 Hz and below 30 Hz, and again better decoded in ventral than lateral temporal cortex. Task-relevant attention improved decoding accuracy more than10% across a wide frequency range in ventral but not at all in lateral temporal cortex. Spatial searchlight decoding showed that decoding performance was highest around the middle fusiform gyrus. Finally, we found that the right hemisphere, in general, showed superior decoding to the left hemisphere. Taken together, our results challenge the dominant model for independent face representation of invariant and changeable aspects: information about both face attributes was better decoded from a single region in the middle fusiform gyrus.     

Understanding the functional neuroanatomy of acquired prosopagnosia

One of the most remarkable disorders following brain damage is prosopagnosia, the inability to recognize faces. While a number of cases of prosopagnosia have been described at the behavioral level, the functional neuroanatomy of this face recognition impairment, and thus the brain regions critically involved in normal face recognition, has never been specified in great detail. Here, we used anatomical and functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) to present the detailed functional neuroanatomy of a single case of acquired prosopagnosia (PS; Rossion, B., Caldara, R., Seghier, M., Schuller, A.-M., Lazeyras, F., Mayer, E., 2003a. A network of occipito-temporal face-sensitive areas besides the right middle fusiform gyrus is necessary for normal face processing. Brain 126, 2381-95; Rossion, B., Joyce, C.A., Cottrell, G.W., Tarr, M.J., 2003b. Early lateralization and orientation tuning for face, word, and object processing in the visual cortex. Neuroimage 20, 1609-24) with normal object recognition. First, we clarify the exact anatomical location and extent of PS' lesions in relation to (a) retinotopic cortex, (b) face-preferring regions, and (c) other classical visual regions. PS' main lesion - most likely causing her prosopagnosia - is localized in the posterior part of the right ventral occipitotemporal cortex. This lesion causes a left superior paracentral scotoma, as frequently observed in cases of prosopagnosia. While the borders of the early visual areas in the left hemisphere could be delineated well, the extensive posterior right-sided lesion hampered a full specification of the cortical representation of the left visual field. Using multiple scanning runs, face-preferring activation was detected within the right middle fusiform gyrus (MFG) in the so-called 'fusiform face area' ('FFA'), but also in the left inferior occipital gyrus (left 'OFA'), and in the right posterior superior temporal sulcus (STS). The dorsal part of the lateral occipital complex (LOC) and the human middle temporal cortex (hMT+/V5) were localized bilaterally. The color-preferring region V4/V8 was localized only in the left hemisphere. In the right hemisphere, the posterior lesion spared the ventral part of LOC, a region that may be critical for the preserved object recognition abilities of the patient, and the restriction of her deficit to the category of faces. The presumptive functions of both structurally damaged and preserved regions are discussed and new hypotheses regarding the impaired and preserved abilities of the patient during face and non-face object processing are derived. Fine-grained neurofunctional analyses of brain-damaged single cases with isolated recognition deficits may considerably improve our knowledge of the brain regions critically involved in specific visual functions, such as face recognition.     

Cortical mechanisms of visual self-recognition

Several lines of evidence have suggested that visual self-recognition is supported by a special brain mechanism; however, its functional anatomy is of great controversy. We performed an event-related functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) study to identify brain regions selectively involved in recognition of one's own face. We presented pictures of each subject's own face (SELF) and a prelearned face of an unfamiliar person (CONT), as well as two personally familiar faces with high and low familiarity (HIGH and LOW, respectively) to test selectivity of activation to the SELF face. Compared with the CONT face, activation selective to the SELF face was observed in the right occipito-temporo-parietal junction and frontal operculum, as well as in the left fusiform gyrus. On the contrary, the temporoparietal junction in both the hemispheres and the left anterior temporal cortex, which were activated during recognition of HIGH and/or LOW faces, were not activated during recognition of the SELF face. The results confirmed the partial distinction of the brain mechanism involved in recognition of personally familiar faces and that in recognition of one's own face. The right occipito-temporo-parietal junction and frontal operculum appear to compose a network processing motion-action contingency, a role of which in visual self-recognition has been suggested in previous behavioral studies. Activation of the left fusiform gyrus selective to one's own face was consistent with the results of two previous functional imaging studies and a neuropsychological report, possibly suggesting its relationship with lexical processing.     

Distinct cortical networks for the detection and identification of human body

In the human brain information about bodies and faces is processed in specialized cortical regions named EBA and FBA (extrastriate and fusiform body area) and OFA and FFA (occipital and fusiform face area), respectively. Here we investigate with functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) the cortical areas responsible for the identification of individual bodies and the distinction between ‘self’ and ‘others’. To this end we presented subjects with images of unfamiliar and familiar bodies and their own body. We identified separate coactivation networks for body-detection (processing body related information), body-identification (processing of information relating to individual bodies) and self-identification (distinction of self from others). Body detection involves the EBA in both hemispheres, and in the right hemisphere: the FBA and areas in the IPL (inferior parietal lobe). Body identification involves areas in the inferior frontal gyrus (IFG) of both hemispheres and in the right hemisphere areas in the medial frontal gyrus (MFG), in the cingulate gyrus (CG), in the central (CS) and the post-central sulcus (PCS), in the inferior parietal lobe (IPL) and the FBA. When the recognition of one's own body is contrasted to the identification of familiar bodies, differential activation is observed in areas of the inferior parietal lobe (IPL) and inferior parietal sulcus (IPS) of the right hemisphere, and in the posterior orbital gyrus (pOrbG) and in the lateral occipital gyrus (LOG) of the left hemisphere. Thus, identification of individual bodies and self-other distinction involve in addition to the classical occipito-parietal network a parieto-frontal network. Interestingly, the EBA shows no differential activation for distinctions between familiar or unfamiliar bodies or recognition of one's own body.     

Inversion and contrast polarity reversal affect both encoding and recognition processes of unfamiliar faces: a repetition study using ERPs.

Using ERPs in a face recognition task, we investigated whether inversion and contrast reversal, which seem to disrupt different aspects of face configuration, differentially affected encoding and memory for faces. Upright, inverted, and negative (contrast-reversed) unknown faces were either immediately repeated (0-lag) or repeated after 1 intervening face (1-lag). The encoding condition (new) consisted of the first presentation of items correctly recognized in the two repeated conditions. 0-lag faces were recognized better and faster than 1-lag faces. Inverted and negative pictures elicited longer reaction times, lower hit rates, and higher false alarm rates than upright faces. ERP analyses revealed that negative and inverted faces affected both early (encoding) and late (recognition) stages of face processing. Early components (N170, VPP) were delayed and enhanced by both inversion and contrast reversal which also affected P1 and P2 components. Amplitudes were higher for inverted faces at frontal and parietal sites from 350 to 600 ms. Priming effects were seen at encoding stages, revealed by shorter latencies and smaller amplitudes of N170 for repeated stimuli, which did not differ depending on face type. Repeated faces yielded more positive amplitudes than new faces from 250 to 450 ms frontally and from 400 to 600 ms parietally. However, ERP differences revealed that the magnitude of this repetition effect was smaller for negative and inverted than upright faces at 0-lag but not at 1-lag condition. Thus, face encoding and recognition processes were affected by inversion and contrast-reversal differently.     

Activation of the fusiform gyrus when individuals with autism spectrum disorder view faces

Prior imaging studies have failed to show activation of the fusiform gyrus in response to emotionally neutral faces in individuals with autism spectrum disorder (ASD) [Critchley et al., Brain 124 (2001) 2059; Schultz et al., Arch. Gen. Psychiatry 57 (2000) 331]. However, individuals with ASD do not typically exhibit the striking behavioral deficits that might be expected to result from fusiform gyrus damage, such as those seen in prosopagnosia, and their deficits appear to extend well beyond face identification to include a wide range of impairments in social perceptual processing. In this study, our goal was to further assess the question of whether individuals with ASD have abnormal fusiform gyrus activation to faces. We used high-field (3 T) functional magnetic resonance imaging to study face perception in 11 adult individuals with autism spectrum disorder (ASD) and 10 normal controls. We used face stimuli, object stimuli, and sensory control stimuli (Fourier scrambled versions of the face and object stimuli) containing a fixation point in the center to ensure that participants were looking at and attending to the images as they were presented. We found that individuals with ASD activated the fusiform face area and other brain areas normally involved in face processing when they viewed faces as compared to non-face stimuli. These data indicate that the face-processing deficits encountered in ASD are not due to a simple dysfunction of the fusiform area, but to more complex anomalies in the distributed network of brain areas involved in social perception and cognition.