Sensory Deprivation and Cognitive Disorder

Abstract

Despite the apparent relevance of studies of the effects of “perceptual isolation” of the kind reported by Bexton et al. (1954) to some of the problems of abnormal psychology and psychiatry, there seems to be a dearth of plausible hypotheses Unking the consequences of this form of deprivation with clinical, disorders. A good deal of experimental evidence from deprivation experiments has been brought together by Solomon et al. (1961) in the report of a symposium held at Harvard Medical School in 1958. In 1959, however, yet another symposium was held at the American Psychological Association's annual meeting in Cincinnati which it was still found possible to entitle “Sensory deprivation: facts in search of a theory” (see Freedman, 1961; Riesen, 1961; Held, 1961; Teuber, 1961; Hebb, 1961).