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Face processing in 8-month-old infants: evidence for configural and analytical processing.

Gudrun Schwarzer·Nicola Zauner
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Abstract

Two experiments examined whether 8-month-old infants process faces (photos in Experiment 1, schematic faces in Experiment 2) analytically by processing facial features independently of the facial context or configurally by processing the features in conjunction with the facial context. Infants were habituated to two faces and looking time was measured. After habituation they were tested with a habituation face, a switch face, or a novel face. In the switch faces, single features of the habituation faces were switched. The results showed that the infants processed facial features of photographs of faces configurally whereas they processed features of schematic faces (eyes, nose, facial contour) analytically. Thus, although infants have access to both processing modes, for real looking faces they use the configural mode.

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Discrimination, PsychologicalFaceFemaleForm PerceptionHumansInfantMalePattern Recognition, VisualRecognition, PsychologyVisual PerceptionJournal Article

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BibTeXRIS

Gudrun Schwarzer, Nicola Zauner. 2003. Face processing in 8-month-old infants: evidence for configural and analytical processing.. https://doi.org/10.1016/s0042-6989(03)00478-4

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