Neonates display reliable visual preferences for human faces and face-like stimuli, which has been taken as strong evidence for an innate domain-specific bias toward faces. Alternatively, neonatal face preference can be explained by an innate non-specific top-heavy configuration bias as faces are inherently top-heavy. My talk will contain three parts. In the first part, I will elaborate the top-heavy bias hypothesis and our recent follow-up studies. Using a forced-choice novelty preference method, we found that 2.5- to 4.5-mo-old infants showed significant and balanced novelty preferences, suggesting a reliable discriminability between the two configurations. Using an eye-tracker, we further examined if the top-heavy bias is still present in 3- to 5.5- mo-old infants and in adults as a comparison group, and found no evidence for the top-heavy bias in both infants and adults. The second part will focus on the development of the other-race effect. Recent studies have shown an early inception of the other-race effect that infants could discriminate own- and other-race faces at 3 months but lose sensitivity for other-race faces from 6 to 9 months; this is explained by the “perceptual narrowing” hypothesis. Using a set of more refined face discrimination tasks, we explored Taiwanese infant’s ability to process own- and other-race faces, and found that the youngest infants exhibited an own-race advantage and their face discrimination ability continued to improve; while their ability to discriminate other-race faces emerged later and maintained at basic level. The finding that infant’s discriminability for other-race faces did not disappear casts serious doubts on the perceptual narrowing hypothesis. In the last part, I will highlight my future directions in the next 5-8 years, which will focus on exploring the (life-long) development of the fifth core knowledge system with a multi-displinary approach.
To sum up, my position on early face and race processing is in line with the experience- expectant view; this view considers the brain specialization as emerging gradually from the interaction between small innate constraints and the critical input provided by the species-typical or race-typical environment. This interactive maturation process enriches infants’ capacities to recognize various faces and paves essential foundations for later cognitive and social development beyond infancy.
參考文獻(點選觀看)：
1. Simion et al (2001)--關於上重偏好理論 (top-heavy bias) 的介紹
2. Chien (2011) JOV--老師對於上重偏好理論的後續研究
3. Anzures et al (2013)-- 關於嬰兒期他種族效應(other-race effect)研究現況的review文獻
講者介紹
簡惠玲 副教授 中國醫藥大學神經科學與認知科學研究所
專長
嬰兒視知覺發展與可塑性、臉孔辨識歷程等
Process for face and race in infancy
學歷
台灣大學植物學系
中正大學心理學研究所
University of Washington, Seattle, Department of Psychology
經歷
科羅拉多州大學認知發展中心博士後研究
台灣大學心理系博士後研究
中國醫藥大學神經科學與認知科學研究所
榮譽紀錄
華盛頓大學社會科學博士論文獎（2002）
中國醫藥大學校級教學優良暨教學創新獎（2012）