Sex categorization of faces: the effects of age and experience

Anne Hillairet de Boisferon; Eve Dupierrix; Lesley Uttley; Lisa M. DeBruine; Benedict C. Jones; Olivier Pascalis

doi:10.1177/2041669519830414

Sex categorization of faces: the effects of age and experience

Anne Hillairet de Boisferon, Eve Dupierrix, Lesley Uttley, Lisa M. DeBruine, Benedict C. Jones, Olivier Pascalis^*

^*Corresponding author for this work

Psychology

Research output: Contribution to journal › Article › peer-review

3 Citations (Scopus)

24 Downloads (Pure)

Abstract

The face own-age bias effect refers to the better ability to recognize the face from one's own age compared with other age groups. Here we examined whether an own-age advantage occurs for faces sex categorization. We examined 7- and 9-year-olds' and adults' ability to correctly categorize the sex of 7- and 9-year-olds and adult faces without external cues, such as hair. Results indicated that all ages easily classify the sex of adult faces. They succeeded in classifying the sex of child faces, but their performance was poorer than for adult faces. In adults, processing time increased, and a response bias (male response) was elicited for child faces. In children, response times remained constant, and no bias was observed. Experience with specific category of faces seems to offer some advantage in speed of processing. Overall, sex categorization is more challenging for child than for adult faces due to their reduced sexual dimorphic facial characteristics.

Original language	English
Pages (from-to)	1-13
Number of pages	13
Journal	i-Perception
Volume	10
Issue number	1
DOIs	https://doi.org/10.1177/2041669519830414
Publication status	Published - 28 Feb 2019

Keywords

experience
face categorization
own-age bias
sex discrimination

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10.1177/2041669519830414Licence: CC BY 4.0

de-Boisferon-etal-iPerception-2019-Sex-categorization-of-facesFinal published version, 528 KBLicence: CC BY 4.0

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title = "Sex categorization of faces: the effects of age and experience",

abstract = "The face own-age bias effect refers to the better ability to recognize the face from one's own age compared with other age groups. Here we examined whether an own-age advantage occurs for faces sex categorization. We examined 7- and 9-year-olds' and adults' ability to correctly categorize the sex of 7- and 9-year-olds and adult faces without external cues, such as hair. Results indicated that all ages easily classify the sex of adult faces. They succeeded in classifying the sex of child faces, but their performance was poorer than for adult faces. In adults, processing time increased, and a response bias (male response) was elicited for child faces. In children, response times remained constant, and no bias was observed. Experience with specific category of faces seems to offer some advantage in speed of processing. Overall, sex categorization is more challenging for child than for adult faces due to their reduced sexual dimorphic facial characteristics.",

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AU - Uttley, Lesley

AU - DeBruine, Lisa M.

AU - Jones, Benedict C.

AU - Pascalis, Olivier

PY - 2019/2/28

Y1 - 2019/2/28

N2 - The face own-age bias effect refers to the better ability to recognize the face from one's own age compared with other age groups. Here we examined whether an own-age advantage occurs for faces sex categorization. We examined 7- and 9-year-olds' and adults' ability to correctly categorize the sex of 7- and 9-year-olds and adult faces without external cues, such as hair. Results indicated that all ages easily classify the sex of adult faces. They succeeded in classifying the sex of child faces, but their performance was poorer than for adult faces. In adults, processing time increased, and a response bias (male response) was elicited for child faces. In children, response times remained constant, and no bias was observed. Experience with specific category of faces seems to offer some advantage in speed of processing. Overall, sex categorization is more challenging for child than for adult faces due to their reduced sexual dimorphic facial characteristics.

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Sex categorization of faces: the effects of age and experience

Abstract

Keywords

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