Own-race Faces Research Articles

Perceptual Other-Race Training Reduces Implicit Racial Bias

BackgroundImplicit racial bias denotes socio-cognitive attitudes towards other-race groups that are exempt from conscious awareness. In parallel, other-race faces are more difficult to differentiate relative to own-race faces – the “Other-Race Effect.” To examine the relationship between these two biases, we trained Caucasian subjects to better individuate other-race faces and measured implicit racial bias for those faces both before and after training.Methodology/Principal FindingsTwo groups of Caucasian subjects were exposed equally to the same African American faces in a training protocol run over 5 sessions. In the individuation condition, subjects learned to discriminate between African American faces. In the categorization condition, subjects learned to categorize faces as African American or not. For both conditions, both pre- and post-training we measured the Other-Race Effect using old-new recognition and implicit racial biases using a novel implicit social measure – the “Affective Lexical Priming Score” (ALPS). Subjects in the individuation condition, but not in the categorization condition, showed improved discrimination of African American faces with training. Concomitantly, subjects in the individuation condition, but not the categorization condition, showed a reduction in their ALPS. Critically, for the individuation condition only, the degree to which an individual subject's ALPS decreased was significantly correlated with the degree of improvement that subject showed in their ability to differentiate African American faces.Conclusions/SignificanceOur results establish a causal link between the Other-Race Effect and implicit racial bias. We demonstrate that training that ameliorates the perceptual Other-Race Effect also reduces socio-cognitive implicit racial bias. These findings suggest that implicit racial biases are multifaceted, and include malleable perceptual skills that can be modified with relatively little training.

Not so black and white: memory for ambiguous group members.

Exponential increases in multiracial identities, expected over the next century, create a conundrum for perceivers accustomed to classifying people as their own- or other-race. The current research examines how perceivers resolve this dilemma with regard to the own-race bias. The authors hypothesized that perceivers are not motivated to include ambiguous-race individuals in the in-group and therefore have some difficulty remembering these individuals. Both racially ambiguous and other-race faces were misremembered more often than own-race faces (Study 1), though memory for ambiguous faces was improved among perceivers motivated to include biracial individuals in the in-group (Study 2). Racial labels assigned to racially ambiguous faces determined memory for these faces, suggesting that uncertainty provides the motivational context for discounting ambiguous faces in memory (Study 3). Finally, an inclusion motivation fostered cognitive associations between racially ambiguous faces and the in-group. Moreover, the extent to which perceivers associated racially ambiguous faces with the in-group predicted memory for ambiguous faces and accounted for the impact of motivation on memory (Study 4). Thus, memory for biracial individuals seems to involve a flexible person construal process shaped by motivational factors.

Deficits in cross-race face learning: Insights from eye movements and pupillometry.

The own-race bias (ORB) is a well-known finding wherein people are better able to recognize and discriminate own-race faces, relative to cross-race faces. In 2 experiments, participants viewed Asian and Caucasian faces, in preparation for recognition memory tests, while their eye movements and pupil diameters were continuously monitored. In Experiment 1 (with Caucasian participants), systematic differences emerged in both measures as a function of depicted race: While encoding cross-race faces, participants made fewer (and longer) fixations, they preferentially attended to different sets of features, and their pupils were more dilated, all relative to own-race faces. Also, in both measures, a pattern emerged wherein some participants reduced their apparent encoding effort to cross-race faces over trials. In Experiment 2 (with Asian participants), the authors observed the same patterns, although the ORB favored the opposite set of faces. Taken together, the results suggest that the ORB appears during initial perceptual encoding. Relative to own-race face encoding, cross-race encoding requires greater effort, which may reduce vigilance in some participants.

The effects of different presentation methods on multi-ethnicity face recognition

Two experiments are reported that examine the effect on later recognition of presenting simultaneously several targets of different ethnicity. In experiment 1, a novel target presentation method was used where participants (children, n=65 and young adults, n=62) were shown a stimulus face sheet of four different race faces followed by a sequential larger (target present/absent) multi-ethnic recognition set. In experiment 2 three different sequential presentation methods were compared in young adults (n=225) that consisted of either (i) make decision (‘seen before’ vs ‘not seen before’) for each of the faces in the whole sequential recognition set; or (ii) make only ‘seen before’ decisions for the whole sequential recognition set; or (iii) a separate sequential lineup for each ethnicity where for each lineup the participants saw all the faces in that lineup and then had to make a decision (target present or absent). Own-race faces were more often correctly rejected (and less falsely identified in experiment 2) than other-race faces. For other-race faces, correct recognition decreased when similar foils were presented before targets in the recognition set but this did not occur for own-race faces. The effect of sequential lineup presentation method emerged for other-race faces favouring separate ethnicity lineups.

Race Coding and the Other-Race Effect in Face Recognition

Other-race faces are generally recognised more poorly than own-race faces. According to Levin's influential race-coding hypothesis, this other-race recognition deficit results from spontaneous coding of race-specifying information, at the expense of individuating information, in other-race faces. Therefore, requiring participants to code race-specifying information for all faces should eliminate the other-race effect by reducing recognition of own-race faces to the level of other-race faces. We tested this prediction in two experiments. Race coding was induced by requiring participants to rate study faces on race typicality (experiment 1) or to categorise them by race (experiment 2). Neither manipulation reduced the other-race effect, providing no support for the race-coding hypothesis. Instead, race-coding instructions marginally increased the other-race effect in experiment 1 and had no effect in experiment 2. These results do not support the race-coding hypothesis. Surprisingly, a control task of rating the attractiveness of study faces increased the other-race effect, indicating that deeper encoding of faces does not necessarily reduce the effect (experiment 1). Finally, the normally robust other-race effect was absent when participants were instructed to individuate other-race faces (experiment 2). We suggest that poorer recognition of other-race faces may reflect reduced perceptual expertise with such faces and perhaps reduced motivation to individuate them.

Two Faces of the Other-Race Effect: Recognition and Categorisation of Caucasian and Chinese Faces

The other-race effect is a collection of phenomena whereby faces of one's own race are processed differently from those of other races. Previous studies have revealed a paradoxical mirror pattern of an own-race advantage in face recognition and an other-race advantage in race-based categorisation. With a well-controlled design, we compared recognition and categorisation of own-race and other-race faces in both Caucasian and Chinese participants. Compared with own-race faces, other-race faces were less accurately and more slowly recognised, whereas they were more rapidly categorised by race. The mirror pattern was confirmed by a unique negative correlation between the two effects in terms of reaction time with a hierarchical regression analysis. This finding suggests an antagonistic interaction between the processing of face identity and that of face category, and a common underlying processing mechanism.

Cross-racial lineup identification: assessing the potential benefits of context reinstatement

The current research examined the potential benefit of context reinstatement on the cross-race effect in lineup identification. Participants viewed a series of own- and other-race faces and subsequently attempted identification of these faces from target-present and target-absent lineups. The traditional cross-race effect was found on measures of discrimination accuracy and response bias; however, discrimination accuracy across own- and other-race faces was shown to interact with context reinstatement such that only own-race faces benefited from the provision of contextual information. This finding is discussed in light of encoding-based theories of the cross-race effect, and with regard to the theoretical and practical limitations of mitigating the phenomenon at the time of identification.

Assessing the influence of recollection and familiarity in memory for own- versus other-race faces

In the present research, we examined the contributions of recollection and familiarity in memory for own- and other-race faces. In Experiment 1, we used a repetition lag paradigm (Jennings & Jacoby, 1997) to demonstrate the typical cross-race effect with respect to discrimination accuracy and response bias. Participants were more likely to commit repetition errors by falsely recognizing repeated other-race faces. In Experiment 2, we used process-dissociation equations to estimate differences in recollection and familiarity. As predicted, results showed a greater reliance on recollection-based processing for own-race faces. The theoretical and practical implications of these findings are discussed.

Own- and other-race categorization of faces by race, gender, and age

We investigated how visual experience with faces of a particular race affects subordinate group-level categorizations in Chinese and Israeli participants living in the respective countries. Categorization of faces by race, gender, and age was examined within subjects with participants who had only minimal experience with the other-race faces. As would be predicted by the previously documented other-race advantage effect, both Chinese and Israeli participants classified the race of the face more quickly and more accurately for other-race than for own-race faces. In contrast, the observers' race did not interact with the race of the rated face either for gender or for age categorization. The absence of these interactions suggests that the physiognomic characteristics that determine the gender and age of a face are universal, rather than race specific. Furthermore, these data suggest that determining the race of a face is not imposed as a first step in face processing, preempting the perception of other category-defining physiognomic characteristics.

Mere Exposure and Racial Prejudice: Exposure to Other-Race Faces Increases Liking for Strangers of that Race

White participants were exposed to other-race or own-race faces to test the generalized mere exposure hypothesis in the domain of face perception, namely that exposure to a set of faces yields increased liking for similar faces that have never been seen. In Experiment 1, rapid supraliminal exposures to Asian faces increased White participants' subsequent liking for a different set of Asian faces. In Experiment 2, subliminal exposures to Black faces increased White participants' subsequent liking for a different set of Black faces. The findings are consistent with prominent explanations for mere exposure effects as well as with the familiar face overgeneralization hypothesis that prejudice derives in part from negative reactions to faces that deviate from the familiar own-race prototype.

Expertise and own-race bias in face processing: an event-related potential study

Humans remember own-race faces more accurately than other-race faces (own-race bias). This effect is reduced by expertise with other-race faces. This study examined event-related potentials to own-race and other-race faces in a group of experts to other-race faces and a nonexpert control group. Both groups exhibited own-race recognition biases. Other-race faces elicited more negative and delayed N170 components, suggesting enhanced configural processing of own-race compared with other-race faces. Moreover, an increased P2 (approximately 210-240 ms) was observed for own-race faces. At right occipitotemporal regions of the experts only this P2 effect was found to be absent. These findings demonstrate an influence of early, presumably presemantic processes on the own-race bias, which are mediated by perceptual expertise with other-race faces.

The role of featural and configural processing in own- and other-race face classification: Behavioral and ERP evidence

Event Abstract Back to Event The role of featural and configural processing in own- and other-race face classification: Behavioral and ERP evidence Z. Lun1, 2, 3 and Shlomo Bentin3* 1 Institute of Linguistics, Xuzhou Normal University, China 2 Key Laboratory of Language Sciences & Neuro-cognitive Engineering, China 3 Department Psychology, The Hebrew University of Jerusalem, Israel While individual own-race faces are identified easier than other-race faces ("the other race effect"; ORE), classification by race is faster for other-race than own-race faces (“the other-race advantage”; ORA). Putatively, both effects reflect acquired expertise within-race, which facilitates individual distinction of own-race faces (on the basis of the distinctive configuration of inner components) while renders other-race faces a more homogeneous group, easier to categorize on the basis of holistic structure or distinctive features. To this end we used ERP and RT measures to explore the consequences of holistic, configural and feature manipulations on the categorization of own and other races by race. Chinese participants in China and Israeli participants in Israel classified full faces, isolated eyes and faces with slight alterations of the spatial configuration of inner components as Chinese or Caucasian. Demonstrating the ORA, across all stimuli the other-race were classified faster than own-race by both Chinese and Israeli participants. For both groups isolating eyes or distorting the face configuration delayed classification of own-race stimuli. For Chinese participants the ORA was equal for full faces and isolated eyes and higher for distorted faces. Israeli participants classified full Chinese faces and isolated eyes at an equal speed (hence showing larger ORA for isolated eyes). Similarly, they classified regular and configural-distorted Chinese faces at equal speed, (hence showing larger ORA for configural faces). The N170 was relatively unaffected by race. In contrast N2 and P3 components elicited by other-race full faces and isolated eyes were bigger than by own-race ones for both groups. Other-race distorted faces also elicited larger N2 and P3 components than own-race faces for Israeli but not for Chinese participants. We conclude that the ORA is based primarily on post-perceptual mechanisms. However, some differences between perceptual strategies of Chinese and Israeliens were also observed: Configural and feature-focused face information is equally used by both groups to process own-race faces. In contrast, Chinese participants based the classification of Caucasian faces on configural/global face-information slightly more than on features, while Israelis focused slightly more on the characteristic features Chinese faces (eyes) than on their configural aspect. Conference: 10th International Conference on Cognitive Neuroscience, Bodrum, Turkey, 1 Sep - 5 Sep, 2008. Presentation Type: Oral Presentation Topic: Perceptual Processing and Recognition Citation: Lun Z and Bentin S (2008). The role of featural and configural processing in own- and other-race face classification: Behavioral and ERP evidence. Conference Abstract: 10th International Conference on Cognitive Neuroscience. doi: 10.3389/conf.neuro.09.2009.01.374 Copyright: The abstracts in this collection have not been subject to any Frontiers peer review or checks, and are not endorsed by Frontiers. They are made available through the Frontiers publishing platform as a service to conference organizers and presenters. The copyright in the individual abstracts is owned by the author of each abstract or his/her employer unless otherwise stated. Each abstract, as well as the collection of abstracts, are published under a Creative Commons CC-BY 4.0 (attribution) licence (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/) and may thus be reproduced, translated, adapted and be the subject of derivative works provided the authors and Frontiers are attributed. For Frontiers’ terms and conditions please see https://www.frontiersin.org/legal/terms-and-conditions. Received: 16 Dec 2008; Published Online: 16 Dec 2008. * Correspondence: Shlomo Bentin, Department Psychology, The Hebrew University of Jerusalem, Jerusalem, Israel, shlomo.bentin@huji.ac.il Login Required This action requires you to be registered with Frontiers and logged in. To register or login click here. Abstract Info Abstract The Authors in Frontiers Z. Lun Shlomo Bentin Google Z. Lun Shlomo Bentin Google Scholar Z. Lun Shlomo Bentin PubMed Z. Lun Shlomo Bentin Related Article in Frontiers Google Scholar PubMed Abstract Close Back to top Javascript is disabled. Please enable Javascript in your browser settings in order to see all the content on this page.

The other-race effect develops during infancy: evidence of perceptual narrowing.

Experience plays a crucial role in the development of face processing. In the study reported here, we investigated how faces observed within the visual environment affect the development of the face-processing system during the 1st year of life. We assessed 3-, 6-, and 9-month-old Caucasian infants' ability to discriminate faces within their own racial group and within three other-race groups (African, Middle Eastern, and Chinese). The 3-month-old infants demonstrated recognition in all conditions, the 6-month-old infants were able to recognize Caucasian and Chinese faces only, and the 9-month-old infants' recognition was restricted to own-race faces. The pattern of preferences indicates that the other-race effect is emerging by 6 months of age and is present at 9 months of age. The findings suggest that facial input from the infant's visual environment is crucial for shaping the face-processing system early in infancy, resulting in differential recognition accuracy for faces of different races in adulthood.

The development of memory for own- and other-race faces

This study demonstrates that experience and development interact to influence the “cross-race effect.” In a multination study ( n = 245), Caucasian children and adults of European ancestry living in the United States, Norway, or South Africa, as well as biracial (Caucasian–African American) children and adults living in the United States, were tested for recognition of Asian, African, and Caucasian faces. Regardless of national or biracial background, 8- to 10-year-olds, 12- to 14-year-olds, and adults recognized own-race faces more accurately than other-race faces, and did so to a similar extent, whereas 5- to 7-year-olds recognized all face types equally well. This same developmental pattern emerged for biracial children and adults. Thus, early meaningful exposure did not substantially alter the developmental trajectory. During young childhood, developmental influences on face processing operate on a system sufficiently plastic to preclude, under certain conditions, the cross-race effect.

Equally attending but still not seeing: An eye-tracking study of change detection in own- and other-race faces

The present study aimed to investigate whether the faster change detection in own-race faces in a change blindness paradigm, reported by Humphreys, Hodsoll, and Campbell (2005) and explained in terms of people's poorer ability to discriminate other-race faces, may be explained by people's preferential attention towards own-race faces. The study by Humphreys et al. was replicated using the same stimuli, while participants’ eye movements were recorded. These revealed that there was no attentional bias towards own-race faces (analysed in terms of fixation order, number, and duration), but people still detected changes in own-race faces faster than in other-race faces. The current results therefore give further support for the original claim that people are less sensitive to changes made in other-race faces, when own and other-race faces are equally attended.

The Other‐Race Effect in Infancy: Evidence Using a Morphing Technique

Human adults are more accurate at discriminating faces from their own race than faces from another race. This other-race effect (ORE) has been characterized as a reflection of face processing specialization arising from differential experience with own-race faces. We examined whether 3.5-month-old infants exhibit ORE using morphed faces on which adults had displayed a crossover ORE (i.e., Caucasians performed better on Caucasian faces and Asians performed better on Asian faces). In this experiment, Caucasian infants who had grown up in a predominantly Caucasian environment discriminated 100% Caucasian faces from 70% Caucasian/30% Asian morphed faces but failed to discriminate between the corresponding 100% Asian and 70% Asian/30% Caucasian faces. Thus, 3.5-month-olds exhibited evidence of ORE. These results indicate that at least by 3.5 months of age, infants have attained enough face processing expertise to process familiar-race faces in a different manner than unfamiliar-race faces.

An own-race advantage for components as well as configurations in face recognition

The own-race advantage in face recognition has been hypothesized as being due to a superiority in the processing of configural information for own-race faces. Here we examined the contributions of both configural and component processing to the own-race advantage. We recruited 48 Caucasian participants in Australia and 48 Chinese participants in Hong Kong, and had them study Caucasian and Chinese faces. After study, they were shown old faces (along with distractors) that were either blurred (isolating configural processing), in which high spatial frequencies were removed from the intact faces, or scrambled (isolating component processing), in which the locations of all face components were rearranged. Participants performed better on the memory test for own-race faces in both the blurred (configural) and scrambled (component) conditions, showing an own-race advantage for both configural and component processing. These results suggest that the own-race advantage in face recognition is due to a general facilitation in different forms of face processing.

Age-related differences in the ability to perceive sad facial expressions

Research has shown that the ability to label negative emotions displayed by facial expressions declines with age. Such studies, however, have tended to adopt the Ekman and Friesen (1976) Caucasian faces as their emotional stimuli. The purpose of the current study was to examine whether the age differences in identifying negative emotions are also found using the more recent Japanese and Caucasian Facial Expressions of Emotion (JACFEE). In Experiment 1, 29 younger and 29 older individuals performed a verbal labeling emotion identification task (happy, sad, angry, frightened, disgusted, surprised, contemptuous). The ability to identify each emotion as a function of ethnicity across the age groups was examined. In order to reduce the verbal decision-making load on the task, a second experiment was conducted in which 60 younger and 60 older participants performed an emotion-matching task (sad, angry, contemptuous). In Experiment 1, older adults showed a significant decrement in the ability to recognize sad faces compared with younger adults, but no age x face ethnicity interaction was found. In Experiment 2, age differences were found when making same/different judgments regarding two sad faces or a sad and a contemptuous face. Results suggest that aging has an impact upon perceiving sad facial expressions, that this effect is not mediated by own-race versus other-race faces, and that age effects are not attributable to differences in verbal decision-making.

Expert face coding: Configural and component coding of own-race and other-race faces

Configural and holistic coding are hallmarks of face perception. Although recent studies have shown that own-race faces are coded more holistically than other-race faces, the evidence for better configural coding of own-race faces is equivocal. We directly measured configural and component coding of own- and other-race male faces in Caucasian and Chinese participants. We manipulated individual features (components) or their spatial relations (configurations) using a novel morphing method to vary difficulty parametrically and tested sensitivity to these changes in a sequential matching task. Both configural and component coding were better for upright own-race than for upright other-race faces. Inversion impaired detection of configural changes more than it did detection of component changes, but also impaired performance more for easier discriminations, independent of type of change. These results challenge explanations of face expertise that rely solely on configural and holistic processing, and also call into question the widespread interpretation of large inversion decrements as diagnostic of configural coding.

Short Article: Reducing the Own-Race Bias in Face Recognition by Shifting Attention

The own-race bias (ORB) in face recognition can be interpreted as a failure to generalize expert perceptual encoding developed for own-race faces to other-race faces. Further, black participants appear to use different features to describe faces from those used by white participants (Shepherd & Deregowski, 1981). An experiment is reported where the size of the ORB was assessed using a standard face recognition procedure. Four groups were tested at two time intervals. One group received a training regime involving learning to distinguish faces that varied only on their chin, cheeks, nose, and mouth. Three control groups did not receive this training. The ORB, present prior to training, was reduced after the critical perceptual training. It is concluded that the ORB is a consequence of a failure of attention being directed to those features of other race faces that are useful for identification.