Characteristics of visual perception of patients’ faces and the formation of “observation” in the process of training cosmetologists

Abstract

Professional experience assists specialists in processing information more quickly and effectively making precise decisions. Visual expertise, as a crucial component of experience, refers to the capability to rapidly perceive visual information within a specific professional domain, acquired through systematic education, professional development, and practice. Numerous studies utilize eye-tracking methods to analyze the relationship between professional experience and gaze patterns. For instance, experienced dermatologists have developed optimal scanning patterns, allowing them to efficiently allocate attention and accurately identify key diagnostic features within images amidst numerous secondary details. The purpose of this study is to analyze changes in oculomotor patterns after completing the author’s training program for doctors, aimed at versatile aesthetic analytics of the face, building individual treatment protocols and increasing the patient’s adherence to aesthetic medicine in order to assess the possibility of developing observation in the conditions of short-term training. Thirty cosmetic doctors participated in the study, which utilized eye-tracking methods with the Neuroburo program-hardware complex. The study was conducted in two phases – before and after training – with 15 patient facial images exhibiting various dermatological issues presented on a computer screen to the cosmetic doctors. Participants were tasked with identifying signs of dermatological disorders of the patients. Following training, a decrease in the number of fixations, an increase in saccadic amplitude, and a reduction in the overall scanning path length were observed among the cosmetic doctors. These findings indicate a more optimized perception strategy and suggest a more systematic and directed approach to diagnostic image analysis. The results suggest an enhanced global perception ability among the doctors, which may aid in recognizing broader patterns and structures and understanding the wider context and relationships between details.