Modeling Face Identification Processing in Children and Adults

Two face identification experiments were carried out to study whether and how children (5-year-olds) and adults integrate single facial features to identify faces. Using the paradigm of the Fuzzy Logical Model of Perception each experiment used the same expanded factorial design, with three levels of eyes variations crossed with three levels of mouth variations as well as their corresponding half-face conditions. In Experiment 1, an integration of facial features was observed in adults only. But, in adjusting the salience of the features varied, the results of Experiment 2indicate that children and adults evaluated and integrated information from both features to identify a face. A weighted Fuzzy Logical Model of Perception fit the judgments significantly better than a Single Channel Model and questions previous claims of holistic face processing. Although no developmental differences in the stage of the integration of facial information were observable, differences between children and adults appeared in the information used for face identification. © 2001 Academic Press Key Words: face perception; information processing; perceptual development. Notwithstanding the impressive face identification capabilities during infancy (e.g., Bushnell, 1982; Bushnell, Sai, & Mullin, 1989; Pascalis, de Haan, Nelson, & de Schoenen , 1998), face identification during the 1st decade of life continues to undergo development. Young children are dramatically worse than adults atencoding and subsequently identifying unfamiliar faces. Marked improvement between ages 2 and 10 is observed on simple recognition tasks (for an overview see Flin & Dziurawiec, 1989 ). Although these differences could be differences in information processing of fa ces, current research does not offer a definite answer. On the one hand, the litera ture on face recognition suggests that 6-year-old children as well as adults process faces holistically (e.g., Carey, 1996). On the other hand research on non facial visual processing modes demonstrated that children 5 years of age and older process visual stimuli analytically as do adults (Ashkenasy & Odom, 1982; Thompson & Massaro, 1989; Wilkening & Lange, 1989). In an attempt to integrate these research lines, in the present study, we investigate face processing by employing expanded factorial designs varying several sources of information and mathematical model testing. We examine whether children’s and adults’ face processing can be explained by analytic models of perception like the Fuzzy Logical Model of Perception or the Single Channel Model. If these models are able to explain face identification data, evidence for analytic face processing is given; if they fail to explain the data, analytic face processing would be questionable.Gudrun Schwarzer (University of Tübingen, Tübingen, Germany) and Dominic W. Massaro (University of California, Santa Cruz)
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