The complete design in the composite face paradigm: role of response bias, target certainty, and feedback

Abstract

Some years ago an improved design (the “complete design”) was proposed to assess the composite face effect in terms of a congruency effect, defined as the performance difference for congruent and incongruent target to no-target relationships (Cheung et al., 2008). In a recent paper Rossion (2013) questioned whether the congruency effect was a valid hallmark of perceptual integration, because it may contain confounds with face-unspecific interference effects. Here we argue that the complete design is well-balanced and allows one to separate face-specific from face-unspecific effects. We used the complete design for a same/different composite stimulus matching task with face and non-face objects (watches). Subjects performed the task with and without trial-by-trial feedback, and with low and high certainty about the target half. Results showed large congruency effects for faces, particularly when subjects were informed late in the trial about which face halves had to be matched. Analysis of response bias revealed that subjects preferred the “different” response in incongruent trials, which is expected when upper and lower face halves are integrated perceptually at the encoding stage. The results pattern was observed in the absence of feedback, while providing feedback generally attenuated the congruency effect, and led to an avoidance of response bias. For watches no or marginal congruency effects and a moderate global “same” bias were observed. We conclude that the congruency effect, when complemented by an evaluation of response bias, is a valid hallmark of feature integration that allows one to separate faces from non-face objects.

The composite face illusion

“…2b), incorporating identical and different distractor halves and all four trial types (e.g., Cheung, Richler, Palmeri, & Gauthier, 2008;Richler, Cheung, & Gauthier, 2011a;Richler, Gauthier, Wenger, & Palmeri, 2008;Richler, Mack, Palmeri, & Gauthier, 2011). Importantly, upright face composite effects calculated using the complete and original matching designs do not correlate (Richler & Gauthier, 2014), suggesting that the variants measure different phenomena; however, the reason for the discrepancy remains contested (Meinhardt, Meinhardt-Injac, & Persike, 2014;Richler & Gauthier, 2013;Rossion, 2013).…”

Holistic processing in the composite task depends on face size

“…Here, we extended these findings, using the composite task, which has been more widely used as a measure of holistic processing (e.g. Cheung et al, 2008; Curby et al, 2013; De Gutis et al, 2013; Gao et al, 2011; Meinhardt et al, 2014; Rossion, 2013; Zhou et al, 2012). In line with McKone (2009), we found that the magnitude of holistic processing was lower as faces were made smaller (i.e.…”

“…However, it is standard in group studies to use the interaction between congruency and alignment, as misalignment greatly reduces the congruency effect (Richler & Gauthier, 2014). The main advantage of the congruency x alignment effect over the alignment effect is robustness to manipulations that influence a particular response bias associated with alignment and congruency (as reviewed by Richler & Gauthier, 2014; see Meinhardt et al, 2014 for the same conclusion). In theory, both measures may tap into the same failures of selective attention in aligned faces, but the two effects show little relation across studies (r = .27, p=.18; Richler & Gauthier, 2014).…”

Holistic integration of gaze cues in visual face and body perception: Evidence from the composite design

“…Although we believe that the alternative variant offers a more balanced design by including a congruency factor, we suggest that researchers should beware of interpretations based on the Congruency 3 Alignment interaction. It is common in research with the alternative design to calculate sensitivity measurements to discriminate between true discriminability (d 0 ) and response bias (criterion c; e.g., Cheung, Richler, Palmeri, & Gauthier, 2008;DeGutis, Wilmer, Mercado, & Cohan, 2013;Gauthier & Bukach, 2007;Horry, Cheong, & Brewer, 2015;Meinhardt et al, 2014;Richler, Cheung, & Gauthier, 2011;Richler, Mack, Palmeri, & Gauthier, 2011). However, we did not follow this tradition in the current study.…”

“…The main difference between the two versions is the number of manipulated factors (see Figure 2), but the standard design can easily be extracted from the alternative design. For this reason, and because research on reliability and response bias seems to point to the alternative variant as the preferable design (Meinhardt, Meinhardt-Injac, & Persike, 2014;Richler, Cheung, & Gauthier, 2011), we opt for this variant in the present study. As can be seen in Figure 2, in the alternative design three factors are manipulated independently: similarity, congruency, and alignment.…”