Are face-responsive regions selective only for faces?

To examine the specificity of face-responsive regions for face processing, we used fMRI to measure the response of the fusiform gyrus and the superior temporal sulcus (STS) to pictures of human faces, animals, faceless animal s, and houses. Results indicate that faces, animals, and faceless animals a ll elicited greater activity than houses, and had identical peaks of activa tion in the lateral fusiform gyrus, bilaterally, and in the right posterior STS. Moreover, within the lateral fusiform gyrus the, responses to faces, animals and faceless animals were all greater than the responses to these s timuli in the medial aspect of the fusiform gyrus, a region that responds m ore strongly to other objects (e.g. houses). These findings suggest that th e neural respresentation of animals in the fusiform gyrus and the posterior STS suggest that the neural representation of relies strongly on the same neural substrates that represent faces. (C) 1999 Lippincott Williams & Wilk ins.