Related data for: Effects of Baby Schema and Mere Exposure on Explicit and Implicit Face Processing

Abstract

In an increasingly multicultural society, the way people perceive individuals from the same vs different ethnic groups greatly affect their own and societal well-being. Two psychological effects that influence this perception are the Mere-Exposure Effect (MRE), whereby the mere familiarity with certain objects or persons is sufficient for people to develop a preference for them and the Baby Schema (BS), a set of specific facial features that evokes caregiving behaviors and an affective orientation in adults. In the present study, we aimed to investigate whether these two effects play a role in physiological responses to babies vs adults' faces belonging to participants’ in-group vs out-group. In study 1, changes in the pupillary diameter of 62 Caucasian participants (M=31; F=31), while observing adult and infant faces of different ethnic groups (Caucasian, Chinese), were measured. In study 2, brain waves of 38 Caucasian participants (M=19; F=19), while observing the same set of faces, were recorded using EEG. In both studies, adults’ explicit preferences (i.e. attitudes, feelings) towards faces were assessed using questionnaires. In Study 1, females showed greater attention to infants than adults (BS effect) on both pupils, regardless of the ethnic group of the face. By contrast, males attended to infants more than adults for out-group faces only (BS effect). In Study 2, greater left posterior-parietal alpha activation towards out-group compared to in-group adult faces was found in males (MRE). Further analyses revealed that participants with low BS effect towards in-group baby faces exhibited greater left posterior alpha activation to out-group than in-group baby faces (MRE). These findings show how different levels of sensitivity to in-group babies may moderate the perception of both in-group and out-group baby faces. Questionnaire measurements on attitudes showed that males and females preferred in-group to out-group adult faces (MRE). Participants in Study 2 also reported a greater preference for infants' than adults' faces (BS effect). Findings explicate the roles of gender and Baby Schema effect in moderating the implicit processing of in-group and out-group faces, despite their lack in moderating explicit self-reports.