Haptic perception in anorexia nervosa before and after weight gain

Haptic perception of patients with anorexia nervosa (n=10) was analyzed in a longitudinal study (T-0-T-1). The haptic explorations consisted of palpat ing the structure of 12 sunken reliefs in sequence with both hands, eyes cl osed. After each exploration the structure was reproduced on a piece of pap er. In the anorexia group, mean exploration time was significantly shorter than in healthy control subjects. However, the reproductions of complex sti muli submitted by the anorexia group were of notably poorer quality than th ose of the healthy controls. This was also observed after weight gain (T-1) . The results of the haptic explorations can be interpreted as a cortical d ysfunction and deficits in somatosensorical integration processing in patie nts with anorexia nervosa. This may be due to a disorder of tactual-spatial processing in the right parieto-occipital regions.