Do neural correlates of face expertise vary with task demands? Event-related potential correlates of own- and other-race face inversion

Abstract

We are typically more accurate at remembering own- than other-race faces. This “own-race bias” has been suggested to result from enhanced expertise with and more efficient perceptual processing of own-race than other-race faces. In line with this idea, the N170, an event-related potential correlate of face perception, has been repeatedly found to be larger for other-race faces. Other studies, however, found no difference in N170 amplitude for faces from diverse ethnic groups. The present study tested whether these seemingly incongruent findings can be explained by varying task demands. European participants were presented with upright and inverted European and Asian faces (as well as European and Asian houses), and asked to either indicate the ethnicity or the orientation of the stimuli. Larger N170s for other-race faces were observed in the ethnicity but not in the orientation task, suggesting that the necessity to process facial category information is a minimum prerequisite for the occurrence of the effect. In addition, N170 inversion effects, with larger amplitudes for inverted relative to upright stimuli, were more pronounced for own- relative to other-race faces in both tasks. Overall, the present findings suggest that the occurrence of ethnicity effects in N170 for upright faces depends on the amount of facial detail required for the task at hand. At the same time, the larger inversion effects for own- than other-race faces occur independent of task and may reflect the fine-tuning of perceptual processing to faces of maximum expertise.

Relationship Between Maternal Sensitivity During Early Interaction and Maternal Ability in Perceiving Infants' Body and Face

“…While these studies show that expertise with a class of stimuli is a requirement for configural processing and the appearance of inversion effects, other studies have also shown that familiarity with specific exemplars within a class of stimuli boosts the use of configural processing (Buttle & Raymond, ; Marzi & Viggiano, ; Veres‐Injac & Persike, ), leading to an advantage for processing familiar versus unfamiliar faces that is lost when stimuli are inverted (Keyes, ). To a similar influence of familiarity are attributed the well‐known own‐race (Meissner & Brigham, ) and own‐age (Rhodes & Anastasi, ) effects, with better performance (Byatt & Rhodes, ; Fulton & Bartlett, ) and greater inversion effects (Rhodes et al., ; Stein et al., ; Wiese, ) for recognition of faces belonging to the same ethnic or age group of the observer or even to a different ethnic or age group with which the observer has had frequent contacts (Hancock & Rhodes, ; Proietti et al., ). While research on the effects of familiarity on body configural processing is less plentiful, a few recent studies have suggested larger inversion effects for familiar than unfamiliar body identities (Robbins & Coltheart, ) and for possible or typical (e.g., humanlike) than impossible or atypical (e.g., doglike) body postures (Reed, Nyberg, & Grubb, ; Reed et al., ).…”

“…Indeed, while evidence of inversion effects is strongly supported by previous studies for both faces (Maurer et al, 2002) and bodies (e.g., Reed et al, 2003Reed et al, , 2006Urgesi, Calvo-Merino, Haggard, & Aglioti, 2007), evidence of composite effects (and holistic processing) is consistent for faces (Maurer et al, 2002), but still controversial for bodies (Soria Bauser, Suchan, & Daum, 2011;Willems, Vrancken, Germeys, & Verfaillie, 2014). Importantly, the extension of configural processing use is dependent on the familiarity the observer has with the stimulus category and with specific exemplars within each category, being higher, for example, for familiar than unfamiliar faces (Buttle & Raymond, 2003;Keyes, 2012;Veres-Injac & Persike, 2009) and for faces belonging to the same ethnic (Rhodes, Tan, Brake, & Taylor, 1989;Wiese, 2013) or age (Proietti, Pisacane, & Macchi Cassia, 2013;Stein, End, & Sterzer, 2014) group of the observer. Nevertheless, whether and to which extent configural processing of faces and bodies is related to maternal sensitivity remain unknown.…”

Inequality between biases in face memory: Event-related potentials reveal dissociable neural correlates of own-race and own-gender biases

“…Previous ERP research on the own-race bias has identified a number of components that differentiate between the processing of own-and other-race faces. First, the N170, a negative deflection peaking approximately 170 ms after stimulus onset (Bentin, Allison, Puce, Perez, & McCarthy, 1996), has been repeatedly found to be larger for other-relative to ownrace faces (e.g., Caharel et al, 2011;Cassidy, Boutsen, Humphreys, & Quinn, 2014;Herrmann et al, 2007;Herzmann, 2016;Montalan et al, 2013;Stahl, Wiese, & Schweinberger, 2008Walker, Silvert, Hewstone, & Nobre, 2008;Wiese, 2012Wiese, , 2013Wiese, Kaufmann, & Schweinberger, 2014). The N170 is usually assumed to reflect processes prior to the identification of individual faces, such as the detection of a face-like stimulus or structural encoding (Amihai, Deouell, & Bentin, 2011;Eimer, 2011;Schweinberger & Burton, 2003).…”

Early identity recognition of familiar faces is not dependent on holistic processing

“…These behavioral effects are reflected in early ERP components associated with face perception. Face inversion causes an increased amplitude and/or increased peak latency in the P100 (Colombatto & McCarthy, 2016;Feng, Martinez, Pitts, Luo, & Hillyard, 2012;Itier & Taylor, 2002, 2004a, 2004b and N170 (Bentin, Allison, Puce, Perez, & McCarthy, 1996;Eimer 2000;Itier & Taylor, 2004c;Rossion et al, 1999Rossion et al, , 2000Wiese 2013).…”