UCSD

Text Box: Rain Bosworth, Ph.D.

Assistant Project Scientist, III

Department of Psychology

University of California, San Diego
9500 Gilman Dr.

La Jolla, CA 92093-0109

Lab: (858) 882-0541, McGill Hall 3321

Departmental Fax:  (858) 534-7190

 

Research Interests:

* Development of Vision in Normal Infants, Preterm Infants, and in Infants with Congenital Eye Disorders

* Clinical Investigation of Binocular Vision, Stereopsis, and Motion Perception

* Neural Plasticity in Deaf and Visually Impaired Populations

       

For Parents  Infant Vision Lab   CV    Research   Publications   Contact

Study Information for Parents of Infants in San Diego

We are recruiting infants under 8 months of age, both normal and infants who have or had cataracts.  Using specialized techniques and equipment these studies will all us to better understand how vision is affected by various visual or eye disorders.  For more information, click here to find out more about our studies.

Research Interests

My research focuses on the plasticity of visual function in both human adults and infants. 

 

Perceptual Studies with Infants and Children with Unilateral Visual Disorders:

I was a post-doctoral fellow at Dr. Eileen Birch’s lab at the Retina Foundation of the Southwest.  At the Retina Foundation, we investigated the effects of early abnormal visual experiences on motion perception and binocularity in infants with various early-onset unilateral visual disorders, such as strabismus, unilateral cataracts, and anisometropia.  Our goal was to test these infants at various ages of onset, ages of successful treatment/recovery, and durations of visual disruption, in order to investigate the relative importance of these timing factors upon the patients’ long-term functional outcome. 

 

I am currently funded to investigate the relative vulnerability of different visual pathways in infants and children who have been treated for unilateral visual disorders such as infantile esotropia and congenital cataracts in collaboration with Dr. Karen Dobkins at the Infant Vision Lab at UCSD and with Shira Robbins, M.D. and David Granet, M.D. at the Ratner Children’s Eye Center.


Cross-modal Perceptual Studies with Deaf Adults:

I am also interested in the following questions, which are related to my doctoral thesis:

  • How does the absence of sensory experience, as in the case of blindness or deafness, alter remaining, intact perceptual abilities?
  • How does unique sensory experience affect cognitive and perceptual domains?
  • Does language modality, visual-signed or auditory-spoken, impact language processing, cognition, and perception?

In pursuing these questions, I have investigated language processing, motion perception, and visual attention in individuals who have been deaf since birth and who are native users of American Sign Language. 

 

Curriculum Vitae  [html]  [pdf]

 

Publications

 

Bosworth, R.G. Bartlett, M.S. & Dobkins, K.R. (2006). Image Statistics of American Sign Language: Comparison to Faces and Natural Scenes.  Journal of Optical Society of America.  in press

 

Bosworth, R.G. & Birch, E.E. (2005). Motion detection in normal infants and young patients with infantile esotropia.  Vision Research, 45(12).  1557-1567. [pdf]

 

Birch, E.E. & Bosworth, R.G. (2004). Visual evoked potentials in infants and children. Chapter in M. J Aminoff (Ed.).  Electrodiagnosis in Clinical Neurology, 5th Edition.  New York: Churchill-Livingstone, pp.439-450.

 

Birch E.E., Felius J., Stager Sr., D.R., Weakley Jr., D.R., & Bosworth R.G.  (2004). Pre-operative stability of infantile esotropia and post-operative outcome. American Journal of Ophthalmology, 138, 1003-9.  [pdf]

 

Hoffman, D.R., Theuer, R.C., Castaneda, Y.S., Wheaton, D.H., Bosworth, R.G., O'Connor, A.R., Morale, S.E., Wiedemann, L.E., & Birch, E.E. (2004). Maturation of visual acuity is accelerated in breast-fed term infants fed baby food containing DHA-enriched egg yolk. Journal of Nutrition, 134 (9), 2307-2313.  [pdf]

 

Bosworth, R.G., Wright, C.E., Bartlett, M.S., Corina, D.P., & Dobkins, K.R. (2003). Characterization of the visual properties of signs in ASL. Chapter in A. E. Baker, B. van den Bogaerde & O. Crasborn (Eds.), Cross-Linguistic Perspectives in Sign Language Research.  Hamburg: Signum Press.

 

Bosworth, R.G. & Dobkins, K.R. (2001). Visual field asymmetries for motion processing in deaf and hearing signers. Brain & Cognition, 49(1). 152-169.  [pdf]

 

Bosworth, R.G. & Dobkins, K.R. (2001).  The effects of spatial selective attention on motion processing in deaf and hearing subjects. Brain & Cognition, 49(1).  170-181.  [pdf]

 

Dobkins, K.R. & Bosworth, R.G. (2000). Effects of set-size and spatial selective attention on motion processing. Vision Research, 41. 1501-1517.  [pdf]

 

Bosworth, R.G. & Dobkins, K.R. (1999).  Left hemisphere dominance for motion processing in deaf signers.  Psychological Science, 10(3), 256-262.  [pdf]

 

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Created and Managed by Rain Bosworth