Familiar other-race faces show normal holistic processing and are robust to perceptual stress.

Full Abstract

Other-race individuals are remembered more poorly and receive less holistic/configural processing than same-race individuals, at least when faces are novel. Here, we examine the amelioration of these effects with familiarity, using distinctiveness-matched Caucasian and Asian stimulus sets. We confirmed a cross-race deficit for upright faces following a single encoding trial, which disappeared rapidly with practice on a small set of other-race 'friends' and did not re-emerge when perceptual processing was put under stress (presentation in the periphery). We also examined holistic/configural processing for familiarised faces using the peripheral inversion effect (McKone, 2004 Journal of Experimental Psychology:
Learning, Memory, and Cognition 30 181 - 197). A test for faces and nonface objects (dogs) confirmed the validity of this technique as providing a direct measure of holistic processing; we then showed that, after 1 h of training, holistic processing was as strong for other-race as same-race faces. We conclude that practice with other-race individuals can rapidly engage normal face-processing mechanisms.

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Author information

Author/s: McKone, Elinor (E); Brewer, Jacqueline L (JL); MacPherson, Sarah (S); Rhodes, Gillian (G); Hayward, William G (WG);

Affiliation: School of Psychology, Australian National University, Canberra, ACT 0200, Australia. Elinor.McKone(-atsign-)anu.edu.au

Journal and publication information

Publication Type: Journal Article; Randomized Controlled Trial; Research Support, Non-U.S. Gov't

Journal: Perception (Perception), published in England. (Language: eng)

Reference: 2007-; vol 36 (issue 2) : pp 224-48

Dates: Created 2007/04/03; Completed 2007/09/26;

PMID: 17402665, status: MEDLINE (last retrieval date: 12/26/2008)

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MeSH headings (categories)

This article was linked to the MESH Headings shown below.

Adolescent
Adult
Animals
Asian Continental Ancestry Group - psychology
Discrimination (Psychology)
Dogs
European Continental Ancestry Group - psychology

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