4b. facial recognition

what did tanaka and farah show with their larry study

faces are processes holistically because we learn them holistically

people who learned larry as a scrambled face were more likely to recognise his nose alone

what does it mean for faces to be represented configurally

the spaces between features are just as important as the features themselves

explain the thatcher illusion

p’s asked to rate two pictures of thatcher based on how gross they were

second was rated as way more gross

because the second image has her features are turned upside down

shows how we process upside down faces as individual features and upright faces considering configuration

explain the 2 potential effects of negation

negation = reverse colouring

disrupts:

1. pigmentation

2. patterns of shading - helps specify 3d structure of faces

what do bruce and hana suggest about line drawings

having shading and lines give best recognition results for famous faces

then shading

then lines

shows how line drawings are hard to recognise without shading or pigmentation

what did valentine and bruce find about facial distinctiveness

distinctive faces are recognised better than average ones

what are bruce and young’s 4 stages of recognising faces

1. structural encoding - form a structural description of face seen

2. face recognition units - match to stored representations of known faces

3. person identity nodes - access semantic info about them

4. name generation - remember name

give evidence for bruce and young’s model

tip of the tongue state:

• evidence for the different levels because we have accessed the face info but still can’t get to the name

• being given their initials is the most helpful info to reach their name

explain the second part to bruce and young’s model - independent processing

processing of expression and facial speech are processed at the same time as structural encoding etc, but separately

this is because we can recognise these things regardless of identity

name two problems with bruce and young’s model

1. independence

2. covert recognition

explain covert recognition as an issue for bruce and young’s model

some patients with prosopagnosia show no overt recognition of famous faces, but do show covert recognition

suggests the element of conscious and unconscious facial recognition routes

explain burton bruce and johnston’s IAC model

can account for covert recognition

we have facial recognition units (FRUs) that hold representations of familiar faces become active when we see a face

name recognition units (NRUs)

person identity nodes (PINs)

all these units work together to identify poeple

which brain areas are most responsive to faces

medial fusiform gyrus

occipital face area

superior temporal sulcus

define prosopagnosia

face blindness

define acquired and developmental prosopagnosia

acquired = people who acquire the disorder after neurological damage

developmental = lifelong recognition impairment - no neurological damage

how does prosopagnosia relate to the bruce and young model

facial recognition processes could break down at any stage - i.e. FRU or PIN

the result would be any form of prosopagnosia