Three hundred Ss, black and white, male and female, at four age levels were tested for their recognition of 12 photographed faces: black, white, male, female, child, adolescent, and adult. Females recognized female faces more frequently than the male faces, while male Ss recognized the male and female faces with equal facility. Whites recognized the white faces more frequently than the black faces, while black Ss recognized the black and white faces with equal facility. Incorrect identifications of 24 faces not actually seen before were treated separately. Male faces and black faces were misidentified more than white faces and female faces. The number of false identifications of faces decreased as Ss increased in age. Perceived beauty in a face facilitated recognition. There was evidence of large differences in memorability among individual faces.adolescents, and adults in their 30s and 40s. The portraits, each about 1 in. square, were arranged randomly on an 8 x 11 in. card in a matrix containing 24 faces, presenting two faces from each of the 12 age-sex-race categories. Two such composites were made. Twelve of the faces, one from each category, were common to both cards and each card had 12 additional faces not appearing on the other card. The consequence of this arrangement of stimuli was that the stimulus sample for recognition included six portraits of males, of females, of blacks, and of whites, and four portraits at each age level. The sample of portraits subject to misidentification was doubled for each category of portrait since 12 different faces appeared in the two matrices.To many uninitiated observers all babies tend to look alike, as do most Orientals. Experience with a group usually leads the observer to make the many fine discriminations possible until he ultimately discovers that the group is composed of individuals with infinitely variable and memorable facial characteristics. Recognition of faces is a complex perceptual achievement with practical applications ranging from identification of criminals to social success at cocktail parties.In the recent literature there are few studies in this area. Howells (1938) reported that women were superior to men and sales personnel superior to farmers. He found a correlation of 0.27 with IQ of the S. Seeleman (1940) found that among white Ss, unfavorable attitudes toward Negroes were related to poor memory for black faces. Goldstein and Chance (1965) report that 9-year-old children found it easier to recognize younger faces than those of the same age or older, but that other age groups of children were not affected by the age of the photographed face. Malpass and Kravitz (1969), working with black and white college students, found that white faces were recognized more frequently than were black faces, but that there was a significant interaction between race of the S and race of the stimulus. Ss having more experience with the opposite race recognized faces of that race more frequently than more racially segregated Ss. Malpass and Kravitz concluded that ...

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