We as human beings all have this wonderful thing inside of our heads; it is called the vertebrate cerebrum. In other words, it is our brain. The human brain is formed by two cerebral hemispheres that are separated by a groove, the longitudinal fissure. The brain can be described as being divided into left and right cerebral hemispheres.
In a normal functioning brain, the left hemisphere of the brain is responsible for controlling the right side of the body. It also performs tasks that have to do with logic, language and analytical classification. On the other hand, the right hemisphere coordinates the left side of the body, and performs tasks that have to do with creativity, art, music and recognition of faces and shapes. For the very few people in this world, split brain patients function very differently.
Split-brain or callosal syndrome is a type of disconnection syndrome when the corpus callosum connecting the two hemispheres of the brain is severed to some degree. It is an association of symptoms produced by disruption of or interference with the connection between the hemispheres of the brain.
In the image above, it shows split-brain patients can only respond to stimuli in the right visual field, but in their left visual field receiving stimuli they are able to see it and draw it, but not recite what they saw. Split brain patients are absolutely fascinating. Although they struggle with day to day normal tasks that regular brain patients do, they can function in a way that no one else can.
In an article that I read, there is a split brain patient named Vicki that struggled with daily tasks that people with normal brain patterns do not have difficulty doing. She would often be grocery shopping and see something in her left field of vision and went to grab it with her left hand, but her right hand often got in the way as she went to make her choices at the grocery store. Vicki described it as: “I’d reach with my right for the thing I wanted, but the left would come in and they’d kind of fight,” she says. “Almost like repelling magnets.” This describes her split brain activity during daily tasks. The article also described that she was put through tests and studies for her brain activity, she was tested how I described the brain pattern above, just like the picture depiction. She was unable to say the things that she saw in her right visual field, and she was not able to say the things she saw in her left visual field, but was able to draw them.
The disorder that Vicki had is an accurate representation of what a split brain patient is like. This article falls into the category of different split brain patterns and studies as I described above. Although it may seem incredible that the human brain is able to act that way, it is extremely serious that can alter a person’s entire life.