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Strategies to Improve Figure-Ground Discrimination
Following are general strategies to help individuals who have difficulties with figure-ground discrimination:
- Weaknesses in figure-ground perception are typically remediated by graded identification procedures in which the individual will search increasingly complex arrays of visual details to locate target shapes and objects. As with the remediation of other visual-spatial abilities, the task should not increase in difficulty until the individual demonstrates proficiency at more basic levels.
- Remedial activities will often require the patient to search through "cluttered" containers of objects to locate familiar objects.
- Compensatory techniques should incorporate forms of environmental restructuring such as organizing living spaces, reducing clutter, limiting the number of visual stimuli, using labels to indicate the location of objects, and improving the contrast of items that need to be identified rapidly (e.g., wheelchair brakes or a call light).
- Systematic search strategies may be taught, emphasizing the thorough and consistent exploration of visual space. Individuals may benefit from learning ways to pace and organize searches, such as with self-instructional statements (e.g., self statements to search slowly, where to begin the search, how to conduct the search, and repeating out load the desired target.).
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