Races and faces — a comparison of the responses of Africans and Europeans to faces of the same and different races

Abstract

There is a popular belief that faces of members of races different from one's own 'look more alike' than those of one's own race. Empirical evidence shows that they differ in memorability. The present study was carried out to test the hypothesis that European and Afiican subjects differ from each other in the cues they use to discriminate among faces of their own and of the other race. Subjects reported the cues by carrying out sorting of triads of faces, and subsequently rating all faces on these cues. INDSCAL analyses were applied to the data. With racially homogeneous sets of faces, European and African subjects did not differ in the basis on which judgements were made, although both used different bases for African than for European faces. When a racially heterogeneous set of faces was used, European subjects discriminated primarily in terms o f racial features, but African subjects used a greater variety of cues.It is a common experience that the faces of members of other races appear to be more similar to each other than do the faces of members of one's own race. In spite of this strong intuitive impression, there is little direct evidence relevant to the problem. Goldstein and his co-workers (Goldstein & Chance, 1976 have compared latencies for same/different judgements between Caucasian faces and between Japanese faces with white American subjects, but have found no consistent effect for race of faces.On the other hand, results of a number of experiments demonstrate that the faces of members of other races are more difficult to remember than the faces of members of one's own race. These results have been obtained in studies varying in methods, subject populations and race of the faces used. American studies have found the effect among black and white grade school children and college students (Feinman & Entwistle, 1976;Malpass & Kravitz, 1969;Galper, 1973), and among white college students for white and oriental faces (Chance et al., 1975); while a British study has found that black Rhodesian soldiers and their female relations as well as white British soldiers and British schoolgirls also remember own-racc faces better than those of the other race (Shepherd el uf., 1974).In spite of the robustness of the effect, no convincing explanation for the phenomenon has been offered. It is possible that subjects pay more attention to and are more interested in faces of members of their own race than they are in those of members of other races. As a result they individualize own-race faces while responding in a categorical, stereotyped manner to other-race faces. Evidence consistent with this hypothesis comes from studies such as those of Galper (1973), where white students in a black studies course showed less o f an own-race effect in face memory than white psychology students, and of Fcinman el af. (1976), who found that subjects from racially integrated census tracts showed less of an own-race effect than subjects from racially segregated tracts. However, these results can be explained by alternative hypotheses...

Cross-cultural effects of color, but not morphological masculinity, on perceived attractiveness of men's faces

“…Our analysis of the association between skin color and attractiveness revealed an -other-race‖ effect, with variation in color cues strongly predicting attractiveness in own-ethnicity faces, whilst this relationship was absent for raters viewing other-ethnicity faces. This may be attributable to a lack of familiarity with other-ethnicity faces, and therefore a lack of familiarity with the meaning of cues in other-ethnicity faces (Shepherd & Deregowski, 1981). Moreover, the effect may be particularly strong in the present study as a consequence of the considerable difference in skin color between African and Caucasian groups which will mean that familiarity with these cues would be particularly limited (Valentine, 1991).…”

The Role of Gender in Face Recognition

“…This own-group bias effect, sometimes labeled out-group homogeneity effect or cross-group deficit, is well documented. The own-bias effect has been found for such characteristics as age, attractiveness, race, and gender (e.g., Fulton & Bartlett, 1991;Lewin & Herlitz, 2002;Lindholm, 2005;Rodin, 1987;Shepherd & Deregowski, 1981;Wright & Sladden, 2003;Wright & Stroud, 2002). However, the explanations for the effects are still under debate.…”

Thirty years of investigating the own-race bias in memory for faces: A meta-analytic review.

“…Finally, within-race rated similarity has shown, at best, only an inconsistent relationship to perception by own-race and other-race individuals, leading Goldstein and Chance (1979) to conclude that, overall, there is little "compelling evidence for the homogeneity hypothesis" (p. 111). We should note that although physiognomic homogeneity may not be responsible for the ORB memory effect, a number of studies have indicated that different physiognomic facial features may be more appropriate for discriminating between faces of certain races (Ellis, Deregowski, & Shepherd, 1975;Shepherd, 1981;Shepherd & Deregowski, 1981).…”