Other-race Effect Research Articles

A Memory Computational Basis for the Other-Race Effect

People often recognize and remember faces of individuals within their own race more easily than those of other races. While behavioral research has long suggested that the Other-Race Effect (ORE) is due to extensive experience with one’s own race group, the neural mechanisms underlying the effect have remained elusive. Predominant theories of the ORE have argued that the effect is mainly caused by processing disparities between same and other-race faces during early stages of perceptual encoding. Our findings support an alternative view that the ORE is additionally shaped by mnemonic processing mechanisms beyond perception and attention. Using a “pattern separation” paradigm based on computational models of episodic memory, we report evidence that the ORE may be driven by differences in successful memory discrimination across races as a function of degree of interference or overlap between face stimuli. In contrast, there were no ORE-related differences on a comparable match-to-sample task with no long-term memory load, suggesting that the effect is not simply attributable to visual and attentional processes. These findings suggest that the ORE may emerge in part due to “tuned” memory mechanisms that may enhance same-race, at the expense of other-race face detection.

Preferential attention to same‐and other‐ethnicity infant faces does not fully overcome the other‐race effect

AbstractGiven the attentional and motivational saliency of infant faces, triggered by a set of perceptual baby schema features, other‐ethnicity infant faces may overcome the processing differences associated with the other‐race effect (ORE). Using an attentional bias paradigm, we found that while there was a same‐ethnicity attentional bias for adult faces, there was no difference in attention to same‐ and other‐ethnicity infant faces, suggesting that other‐ethnicity infant faces are equally salient and not subject to the same bias as other‐ethnicity adult faces. To directly measure the ORE, we used a recognition memory test to measure differences between same‐ and other‐ethnicity infant and adult faces. Regardless of age, same‐ethnicity faces were better remembered than other‐ethnicity faces. Further, regardless of ethnicity, adult faces were better remembered than infant faces, a finding consistent with an Other Age Effect. Taken together, these experiments suggest that the saliency of baby schema does not fully overcome the social or perceptual factors leading to the ORE.

No evidence of other‐race effect for Chinese faces in Malaysian non‐Chinese population

SummaryThe other‐race effect (ORE) reflects poor recognition of faces of a different race to one's own. According to the expertise‐individuation hypothesis, this phenomenon is a consequence of limited experience with other‐race faces. Thus, similar experience with own and other‐race faces should abolish the ORE. This study explores the ORE in a multi‐racial country (i.e., Malaysia) by comparing Malaysian observers' face recognition for faces of a predominant racial group in Malaysia (i.e., Chinese) with faces from an uncommon group (i.e., Caucasian). Malaysian Chinese, Malays, and Malaysian Indians completed the Cambridge Face Memory Test (CFMT) and the CFMT‐Chinese. Compared with the normative scores, Malaysian observers showed poor performance in the CFMT‐Caucasian. Interestingly, Malays and Malaysian Indians observers' performance was identical to that of Malaysian Chinese in the CFMT‐Chinese and to the normative scores of the test. These results demonstrate the relevance of experience in shaping the ORE.

“They all still look the same to me”: Navon processing and the cross-race effect

ABSTRACTResearch suggests the Cross-Race Effect (CRE), the difficulty to remember faces from a different race relative to their own, is due to other race faces being processed featurally. It has been theorised that if individuals process other race faces the same as they do same race faces (globally) the CRE could be attenuated. Research inducing global processing, through the use of a Navon processing task, has improved memory for same race faces. Across two experiments we explored if inducing global processing through the Navon processing task prior to encoding (Experiment 1) and at both encoding and retrieval (Experiment 2) would reduce the CRE. Results revealed that biasing White participants’ processing orientations failed to improve memory for Black faces. Furthermore, in Experiment 2, global processing impaired participants’ memory for identifying faces relative to a control group. Practical implications and the need to address inconsistencies in the Navon processing literature are discussed.

Learning own- and other-race facial identities: Testing implicit recognition with event-related brain potentials

Exposure to varying images of the same person can encourage the formation of a representation that is sufficiently robust to allow recognition of previously unseen images of this person. While behavioural work suggests that face identity learning is harder for other-race faces, the present experiment investigated the neural correlates underlying own- and other-race face learning. Participants sorted own- and other-race identities into separate identity clusters and were further familiarised with these identities in a matching task. Subsequently, we compared event-related brain potentials (ERPs) in an implicit recognition (butterfly detection) task for learnt and previously unseen identities. We observed better sorting and matching for own- than other-race identities, and behavioural learning effects were restricted to own-race identities. Similarly, the N170 ERP component showed clear learning effects for own-race faces only. The N250, a component more closely associated with face learning was more negative for learnt than novel identities. ERP findings thus suggests a processing advantage for own-race identities at an early perceptual level whereas later correlates of identity learning were unaffected by ethnicity. These results suggest learning advantages for own-race identities, which underscores the importance of perceptual expertise in the own-race bias.

A critical period for faces: Other-race face recognition is improved by childhood but not adult social contact

Poor recognition of other-race faces is ubiquitous around the world. We resolve a longstanding contradiction in the literature concerning whether interracial social contact improves the other-race effect. For the first time, we measure the age at which contact was experienced. Taking advantage of unusual demographics allowing dissociation of childhood from adult contact, results show sufficient childhood contact eliminated poor other-race recognition altogether (confirming inter-country adoption studies). Critically, however, the developmental window for easy acquisition of other-race faces closed by approximately 12 years of age and social contact as an adult — even over several years and involving many other-race friends — produced no improvement. Theoretically, this pattern of developmental change in plasticity mirrors that found in language, suggesting a shared origin grounded in the functional importance of both skills to social communication. Practically, results imply that, where parents wish to ensure their offspring develop the perceptual skills needed to recognise other-race people easily, childhood experience should be encouraged: just as an English-speaking person who moves to France as a child (but not an adult) can easily become a native speaker of French, we can easily become “native recognisers” of other-race faces via natural social exposure obtained in childhood, but not later.

Lifetime perceptual experience shapes face memory for own- and other-race faces

ABSTRACTAdults show impaired recognition of other-race compared to own-race faces. This other-race effect (ORE) is suggested to be the result of asymmetrical perceptual experience with own- and other-race faces during development. However, it is unclear whether the impact of experience on adults’ ORE differs across development, and whether experience during adulthood can exert similar effects as experience during development. To investigate these questions, we tested face recognition in White adults, East Asian (EA) adults born and raised in Canada, and EA adults who immigrated to Canada at different ages from infancy to adulthood. When recognizing upright faces, White adults and EA immigrants demonstrated a reliable ORE, whereas EA adults born in Canada showed no ORE. These effects were not present when recognizing inverted faces. Notably, age of arrival positively predicts the magnitude of the ORE. Our study highlights the influence of early experience on the ORE and suggests that the ORE appears relatively unmalleable during adolescence and adulthood.

Intentionally remembering or forgetting own- and other-race faces: Evidence from directed forgetting.

People are better at remembering faces of their own relative to another ethnic group. This so-called own-race bias (ORB) has been explained in terms of differential perceptual expertise for own- and other-race faces or, alternatively, as resulting from socio-cognitive factors. To test predictions derived from the latter account, we examined item-method directed forgetting (DF), a paradigm sensitive to an intentional modulation of memory, for faces belonging to different ethnic and social groups. In a series of five experiments, participants during learning received cues following each face to either remember or forget the item, but at test were required to recognize all items irrespective of instruction. In Experiments 1 and 5, Caucasian participants showed DF for own-race faces only while, in Experiment 2, East Asian participants with considerable expertise for Caucasian faces demonstrated DF for own- and other-race faces. Experiments 3 and 4 found clear DF for social in- and outgroup faces. These results suggest that a modulation of face memory by motivational processes is limited to faces with which we have acquired perceptual expertise. Thus, motivation alone is not sufficient to modulate memory for other-race faces and cannot fully explain the ORB.

Recognition of a Missing Person in a Mock Silver Alert in Relation to Individual Difference Factors and the Effect of an Educational Video

In two studies, we investigated participants’ ability to recognize a missing older adult featured in a mock Silver Alert. Previous research on face recognition indicates the presence of biases related to demographic variables such as gender, race, and age; thus, we compared recognition of the target in relation to these variables. Further, we explored recognition of the target in relation to empathy, conscientiousness, attitudes toward and contact with older individuals as these variables may play a role in motivation and attention to these types of alerts. In Study 1, college students (N = 610) viewed both a video of the missing man and an educational video on Silver Alerts before attempting recognition, whereas in Study 2 (N = 350), we experimentally manipulated whether participants viewed the educational video. Both studies resulted in high recognition rates (83.90% and 75.1%, respectively). Study 2 did not show a significant effect of the educational video, perhaps because of the effectiveness other components of both studies, such as the additional video of the target. Those who recognized the target had significantly higher empathy scores and metacognitive ratings (i.e., confidence) in both studies, with inconsistent differences on other individual difference variables. Caucasian participants were more likely than African-American participants to recognize the Caucasian male target, consistent with previous research on Own-Race Bias in face recognition. Additional research is needed to explore ways of improving the public’s ability to recognize missing senior citizens.

Race effects in facial recognition: the evolution

Introduction: In our everyday life we see a large number of faces that share a set of basic elements, making it necessary to distinguish those that we already know from those we know for the first time. This is particularly important in crimes where victims need to identify their offenders, making facial recognition an important theme in Forensic Psychology [1]. Over the time, there are more and more studies that attach greater importance to the face, which is increasingly considered an important aspect for human interaction since it provides a large amount of information that should be analyzed efficiently [2]. It is known that we have more difficulties in recognizing a face from a different race of our own, and this variable has been designated as race bias, cross race effect, other race bias and own race bias. This paper aims at a better understanding of race effects in face recognition from the 80’s until today as it is still an understudied but relevant subject to Forensic Psychology. Materials and methods: For this study we included articles that focused on the effect of race on face recognition. To that end, studies were included from the 80’s until 2018, written in Portuguese, English and Spanish. Quantitative studies were included. Finally, the research was limited to articles published in peer-reviewed journals/journals limited to full-text articles. The articles were selected by reading the title and the respective abstract. The included articles are available in full text in the EBSCOhost Web, B-On and SAGE Journals databases. The articles were found by combining the following descriptors: “other race bias”; “own race bias” and “eyewitness AND cross-race identifications”. After applying the inclusion criteria, a total of 510 articles were found (already with the duplicates removed). Of the total number of articles 497 articles were excluded. These were excluded for the following reasons: they were not available for reading (n = 257); are not quantitative studies (n = 113); do not report the effect of race on face recognition (n = 77); were not relevant to forensic psychology (n = 50). Results: In this review, 13 empirical articles were included, most of them being carried out between 2004 and 2016, reinforcing the importance given to this issue today. The absence of studies between 1990 and 2004 could be due to a possible lack of interest in the subject during this time. Most studies are distributed across Europe (n = 7) and North America (n = 5) and only one in Asia (Zhou, Pu, Young, & Tse, 2014). The total number of participants is 1493, with the lowest being 40 participants (Brigham, Maass, & Martinez, 1983, Yan, Andrews, Jenkins & Young, 2016) and the largest being 304 participants (Lawson & Dysart, 2014). Only five studies used an experimental method (38%) while the others used quantitative methods (62%). After analysing the articles chosen, it was possible to underline some results. In the 80’s, it was believed there was no bias in facial recognition when it came to race [3], thus it was pointed out that own-race effect is no more common than the cross-race identifications [4]. However, in the 90’s it started to be implied that there was a better memory to identify own race faces than other races, which meant that other race bias would increase when the contact with other races would decrease [4]. In the new millennium, a greater number of variables, as well as the use of different methodologies and facial recognition technique begins to emerge. In a showup, observing an innocent person of the same race of the perpetrator suspect increased the identification of false lineups [5]. Young people have a better accuracy when discriminating their own race from other races, which is not influenced by interracial contact, unlike what happens with elderly [6]. Also, Caucasian people were found to make more mistakes in identifications, comparing to other races, and it’s more common to mistake identity and expressions of Caucasian than Asian faces [7]. Facial expressions began to be given more relevance in the last few years [7]. Discussion and conclusions: There are significant differences in how individuals of different races look at the same face and determine recognition points differing from each other. Some faces are better recognized than others, creating practical implications in white witnesses which will lead to a greater probability of identifying a non-familiar black face than an unfamiliar face white and thereby increasing the likelihood of “false positive” results when the lineups are shown [5]. There is still no significant methodology evolution to test the effect of race in facial recognition, being the most used one the grey-scale photography line up.

Own-race and other-race face recognition problems without visual expertise problems in dyslexic readers

Both intact and deficient neural processing of faces has been found in dyslexic readers. Similarly, behavioral studies have shown both normal and abnormal face processing in developmental dyslexia. We tested whether dyslexic adults are impaired in tests of own-race and other-race face recognition. As both face and word recognition rely considerably on visual expertise, we wished to investigate whether face recognition problems of dyslexic readers might stem from difficulties with experience-driven expert visual processing. We utilized the finding that people tend to be worse at discriminating other-race faces compared to own-race faces, the so-called other-race effect, thought to reflect greater experience with own-race faces. If visual expertise is compromised in dyslexic readers, so that their visual system is not effectively shaped by experience, then they might show a diminished other-race effect. Matched dyslexic and typical readers completed two tests of own- and other-race face recognition. The results show that dyslexic readers have problems with recognizing faces, and these difficulties are not fully accounted for by general problems with attention or memory. However, recognition is compromised for both own- and other-race faces, and the strength of the other-race effect does not differ between dyslexic and typical readers. There was individual variability in both groups, and an exploratory analysis revealed that while dyslexic readers with no university education showed deficits in face recognition, the dyslexic participants with higher education did not. We conclude that dyslexic readers as a group have face recognition problems. These are potentially modulated by educational level but compromised visual expertise cannot demonstrably account for the face recognition problems associated with dyslexia. We discuss the implications of these findings for theoretical accounts of dyslexia and for theories of word and face recognition.

Assessment of the Influence of "Other-Race Effect" on Visual Attention and Perception of Attractiveness Before and After Rhinoplasty.

The "other-race effect" describes the phenomenon in which individuals demonstrate greatest recognition ability among faces of their own race. Thus, in our multicultural world, it follows that race influences social interactions. However, the association of race with perception of plastic surgery outcomes has not been studied. To objectively measure how the other-race effect influences perception of white and Latin American patients undergoing rhinoplasty by using eye-tracking technology and survey methodology. In the first part of the study, 134 participants viewed 32 paired facial images of white and Latin American patients, either prerhinoplasty or postrhinoplasty, on an eye-tracking system that recorded observer scan paths. In the second part of this study, the same patient images were individually graded by a separate group of 134 participants for degree of racial identification and perceived attractiveness. The primary outcome was to measure the influence of patient and observer race on perception of rhinoplasty outcomes. For the eye-tracking part, planned hypothesis testing was conducted using an analysis of variance to compare patient race, rhinoplasty status, and attractiveness with respect to visual fixation time. Of the 134 eye-tracking participants, 68 (51%) were women and the mean (SD) age was 26.4 (7.7) years; of the 134 graders, 64 (48%) were women and the mean (SD) age was 25.0 (6.9) years. Rhinoplasty did not affect racial identity scores among either same-race or other-race evaluators. Visual fixation times for white faces were significantly increased compared with Latin American faces among all casual observer groups (white observers mean change, -20.14 milliseconds; 95% CI, -29.65 to -10.62 milliseconds; P < .001; Asian observers mean change, -39.04 milliseconds; 95% CI, -48.95 to -29.15 milliseconds; P < .001; and African American observers mean change, -20.73 milliseconds; 95% CI, -37.78 to -3.69 milliseconds; P < .02), with the exception of Latin American observers (mean change, -7.8 milliseconds; 95% CI, -29.15 to 14.39 milliseconds; P < .51). With respect to attractiveness, white graders reported a significant postrhinoplasty increase across both races (white patients mean change, 8.07 points; 95% CI, 5.01-11.12 points; P < .001; and Latin American patients mean change, 3.69 points; 95% CI, 0.87-6.49 points; P = .01), whereas Latin American graders only observed a significant attractiveness increase in their own race (Latin American patients mean change, 10.50 points; 95% CI, 1.70-19.32 points; P = .02). Neither perceived attractiveness nor rhinoplasty status influenced fixation times. Both patient and observer race influence visual attention and perception of attractiveness before and after rhinoplasty. These findings underscore the importance of counseling patients that the influence of rhinoplasty, as perceived by the casual observer, may vary by race or ethnicity of the observer group. NA.

Reduced perceptual specialization in autism: Evidence from the other-race face effect.

Emerging accounts of autism suggest that flexible and broadly tuned perceptual representations, presumably resulting from reduced specialization, may underlie atypical perception. Here, we examined the other-race effect (ORE) to study face processing specialization arising from specific experience with own-race faces. Face discrimination was tested for own- and other-race faces in typically developed individuals and in individuals with autism spectrum disorder (ASD). For each race, faces were morphed to vary discrimination difficulty, and orientation was manipulated to examine inversion effects. The ASD group displayed overall lower sensitivity and reduced inversion effects in processing faces. Importantly, the processing advantage for own-race faces was substantially smaller in this group, resulting specifically from the reduced specialization for the own-race faces. Moreover, the typical larger inversion effect for Caucasian faces was not observed in the ASD group; sensitivity to orientation was smaller and equivalent for the two face races. These more broadly tuned representations in autism may account for the overall weaker representations of faces and suggest, more broadly, that a failure in perceptual specialization may underlie atypical perception in autism. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2019 APA, all rights reserved).

Children’s recognition of emotion expressed by own-race versus other-race faces

Adults are less accurate at recognizing emotions expressed by individuals from a different cultural background. However, the research with children is less clear; whereas some studies suggest better emotion recognition for own-race and own-culture faces, others have found no such relationship. The current study examined the influence of race on emotion recognition in children and adults who share a cultural background (i.e., Canadian). Based on previous studies, we hypothesized that participants would demonstrate better emotion recognition for own-race faces. We also hypothesized that emotion recognition would improve across the lifespan (from childhood to adulthood) and as a function of emotion, such that recognition would be better for happy faces than for the other emotions. Children (n = 69; ages 6–10 years; 41 female) and adults (n = 82; mean age = 19.94 years; 72 female) of Western European or South Asian descent were asked to complete a five-alternative forced-choice emotion recognition task (anger, fear, happiness, sadness, and neutral) in which expressions were displayed by White and South Asian faces. As predicted, adults performed better than older children, who performed better than younger children, and participants performed best on happy faces. South Asian participants, but not White participants, performed better when judging own-race faces compared with other-race faces. This finding only partially supports an own-race bias in emotion recognition and may reflect the tendency in the literature to conflate culture and race. More studies are needed to understand cross-race emotion recognition when individuals share the same culture.

Eliminating other-race effect for multi-ethnic facial expression recognition

It has been noticed that the performance of multi-ethnic facial expression recognition is affected by other-race effect significantly. Though this phenomenon has been noticed by psychologists and computer vision researchers for decades, the mechanism of other-race effect is still unknown and few work has been done to compensate or remove this effect. This work proposes an ICA-based method to eliminate the other-race effect in automatic 3D facial expression recognition. Firstly, the depth features are extracted from 3D local facial patches, and independent component analysis is applied to project the features into a subspace in which the projected features are mutually independent. The ethnic-related features and expression-related features are supposed to be separated in ICA subspace. Hence, ethnic-sensitive features are then determined by an entropy-based feature selection method and discarded to depress their influence on facial expression recognition. The proposed method is evaluated on benchmark BU-3DFE database, and the experimental results reveal that the influence caused by other-race effect can be suppressed effectively with the proposed method.

Impressions of sexual unfaithfulness and their accuracy show a degree of universality

Forming accurate impressions of others’ trustworthiness is a critical social skill, with faithfulness representing a key aspect of trust in sexual relationships. Interestingly, there is evidence for a small degree of accuracy in facial impressions of sexual unfaithfulness. Theoretical accounts suggest that these impressions may function to help with partner selection, and may be universal. If so, impressions should be similar for perceivers from different cultures and accuracy should not be limited to own-race faces. We tested these predictions by asking Caucasian and Asian women to judge the likelihood of unfaithfulness from the faces of Caucasian males whose past sexual history was known. In two studies we found high cross-cultural agreement in these impressions, consistent with universality in the impressions themselves. In Study 1, we found an other-race effect in impression accuracy, with significantly less accurate cross-race impressions by Asian women than own-race impressions by Caucasian women. Asian women showed no accuracy. Interestingly, in Study 2, Asian women who had grown up in the West showed small but significant accuracy in their impressions, with no other-race effect. Results are consistent with a degree of universality in the accuracy of this important aspect of social perception, provided that perceivers have experience with the faces being assessed.

The Own-Race Bias and the cerebral hemispheres

ABSTRACTThe Own-Race Bias (ORB) is the ability to better recognize and categorize a face when the depicted person belongs to the observer’s ethnicity group. The relationship between the ORB and hemispheric asymmetries has been poorly explored, and the present study was aimed at investigating this relationship, as well as that between the ORB and the bias to better recognize own gender faces. Female and male Caucasian participants categorized the ethnicity of Caucasian and Asian female and male facial stimuli in a divided visual field paradigm. In a control experiment the same stimuli were presented centrally, confirming the ORB. Importantly, the lateralized presentation reversed the bias with higher accuracy and shorter response times in the categorization of Asian than Caucasian faces. This reversed bias was significant for female and male faces, and it was observed when stimuli were presented in the left but not in the right visual field, revealing the crucial role of the right hemisphere in face processing. These results shed new light on the hemispheric abilities in the categorization of facial features, and they are compared to previous evidence of cerebral asymmetries for facial age, gender and identity, both in healthy participants and in neurological patients.

Bilingualism shapes the other race effect

It has recently been suggested that the other race effect (ORE), whereby own race faces are recognised better than those of other races, can be abolished by bilingualism.Bilingualism, however, is not a categorical variable but can vary dramatically in proficiency across the two languages. We therefore hypothesised that increasing bilingual proficiency should be associated with a diminishing ORE. To test this, we asked a group of bilingual Singaporean Chinese individuals to complete the Asian and Caucasian Cambridge Face Memory Tests. In contrast to recent work, our bilinguals did as a group exhibit an ORE, however, the magnitude of this effect decreased as reported cross-language proficiency increased; Chinese, rather than English, listening ability drove this association. This relationship persisted even when taking into account our participants’ exposure to Caucasians, own race memory ability, age, and gender. Moreover, we discounted the possibility that bilingualism merely reflected participants’ underlying intelligence. Increasing auditory bilingualism thus diminishes perceptual narrowing for faces. We propose that other race recognition ability reflects the base level of intrinsic, domain specific face memory, whereas the distance in recognition performance between own and other race faces is comprised of a domain general process related to stimulus individuation. Finally, our results have serious implications for how we can interpret prior research investigating the ORE, and culture’s influence on visual perception, due to the confounding influence of bilingualism.

Seeing morphing faces of own- and other-race: the development of face discrimination in 3- to 7-year-old Taiwanese children

Introduction. Previous studies on the other-race effect (ORE) in preschoolers and children mostly focused on recognition memory performance; however, the onset of ORE has been inconclusive across studies. Here we wish to explore the development of the ORE in 3- to 7-year-old Taiwanese children with a simultaneous morphing face discrimination task. Method. A set of morphed images of Caucasian and Asian male and female faces were used. In Experiment 1, 3- to 4-year-old children (N = 41) were tested with a forced-choice simultaneous pointing task. They viewed an Asian or Caucasian target parent face followed by a pair of comparison faces, with one being the "same parent" face and the other as a "different" morphed face (i.e., 30%, 60%, or 90% contribution from the other parent face). Children were asked to point out the same face with their fingers. In Experiment 2, 5- to 7-year-old children (N = 45) and adults (N=16) were tested with a forced-choice simultaneous matching task. The stimuli were the same as in Exp. 1, but the participants were asked to identify the face that was different from the target with keypress. Results. The results showed that, for all age groups, the accuracies of correctly pointing to the same or identifying the different face increased as the morph level increased, and the mean accuracies for the Asian- and Caucasian-parent conditions were about equal. Adults and 5- to 7-year-old children outperformed 3- and 4-year-old children at all morph levels; the performance of 7 year-olds at the three morph levels started to look adult-like. Conclusion. In sum, using the simultaneous morphing face pointing/matching task, the present study did not reveal an ORE in Taiwanese children aged between 3 and 7. However, a clear developmental progression in processing morphing faces was evident between young children and adults. Meeting abstract presented at VSS 2018

Implicit measurement of the own-race bias using the visual search paradigm

Implicit measurement of the own-race bias using the visual search paradigm