The Development And Influencing Factors Of Own-age Effect In Face Recognition

The own-age effect refers to that individuals show superior performance in identifying faces of their own age when compared with other-age faces. This phenomenon is not only an important research topic in the field of face recognition, but also the crucial study object in social psychology. Although a lot of researchers have raised a variety of theoretical hypothesis from different angles so far, there are still some differences and rooms for discussion. The studies on the own-age effect can help to improve the identification accuracy of different age eyewitness in the field of administration of justice. According to the results of this study, we can also design a reasonable plan to give effective interventions in our daily life existing the own-age effect and to explore effective ways to reduce the bias. Based on previous studies, the research aims to explore the performance of individuals at different ages recognizing their own-age and other-age faces as well as the influencing factors of the effect.Four experiments were included in the research:In order to verify the existence of own-age effect and lay the foundation for further research on its influencing factors, experiment1examined the own-age effect of children (7-8years old), young adults (18-25years old) and older adults (60-70years old) by adopting a3(participant age:children, young adults, older adults) X3(face age:children, young adults, older adults) mixed design.Starting form the perceptual expertise hypothesis, we examined the own-age effect in two groups of60participants who have different degree of exposure to children in experiment2, in which30preschool teachers (mean age20.7years old) served in experimental group and30undergraduates (mean age20.6years old) in control group. The face stimulus consisted of children and young adults and all of the participants were asked to study the two types of faces. The purpose of the experiment was to explore the role of the perceptual expertise in the own-age effect.Experiment3aimed to investigate the effect of two different processing ways on the performance of subsequent recognition of own and other-age faces.128undergraduates (mean age20.2years old) were participated in this experiment.To assess the influence of motivation level of processing faces on the own-age effect, a3(motivation groups:children motivated, young motivated, control)×2(face age:children, young adults) mixed design was employed.72undergraduates were participated in this experiment.The results were as follows:(1) All three groups of participants showed the own-age effect, and there was no significant difference among individuals of different ages for the effect size.(3) More recent experiences drove the own-age effect rather than more distant prior experiences. The preschool teachers who have6-12months contact with children showed no own-age effect.(4) The different ways of processing faces during face encoding had an influence on the own-age effect. Provided that participants made an individuation coding for own-age faces and categorization coding for other-age faces, they showed the own-age effect; however, in the condition that people made an individuation coding for other-age faces and categorization coding for own-age faces, individuation coding for own and other-age faces as well as categorization coding for the two types of faces, there was no significant difference between the performance of own and other-age faces.(5) The recognition performance of certain type of face was influenced by the level of motivation. Participants were more accurate at recognizing faces of other age with higher level of motivation.