face recognition Flashcards
What is the Bruce and Young (1986) model of face recognition?
It is a modular model where different sub-functions, such as recognizing familiar faces, expressions, and visually derived semantic information, are processed independently in parallel pathways.
What is a Face Recognition Unit (FRU) in the Bruce and Young model?
FRUs are modules activated by familiar faces, linked to Person Identity Nodes (PINs) that access semantic information about the person.
What role do Person Identity Nodes (PINs) play in face recognition?
They act as gateways to semantic information and are linked to name generation.
What evidence supports Bruce and Young’s model?
Studies like Young, Hay, and Ellis (1985) found common memory errors like recognizing a face but failing to retrieve the name, and repetition priming effects for familiarity decisions.
What does neuropsychological evidence reveal about face recognition?
There is a double dissociation between processing facial identity and expression: deficits can affect one without impairing the other (e.g., Bruyer et al., 1983; Humphreys et al., 1993).
What does neuroimaging evidence reveal about parallel processing in face recognition?
Different cortical sites are active for identity (e.g., inferior occipital and lateral fusiform gyri) versus expression (e.g., amygdala and superior temporal sulcus).
What is semantic priming in face recognition?
Responses to a face are faster when preceded by a related face (e.g., Prince Charles followed by Diana), as shown by Bruce and Valentine (1986).
What does the Interactive Activation and Competition (IAC) model propose?
It uses parallel distributed networks where face familiarity (FRUs), modality-free gateways (PINs), and semantic information are connected, with facilitatory and inhibitory interactions.
What does the IAC model explain about face recognition?
It accounts for empirical data such as repetition priming, semantic priming, and cross-modal priming (e.g., a spoken name priming a face).
Why is face recognition challenging despite shared face configurations?
All faces share the same basic first-order relationships (e.g., two eyes above a nose and mouth), making individual recognition reliant on fine-grained second-order relationships.
What are second-order relationships in face recognition?
Subtle spatial interrelationships between facial features that encode individual differences, such as metric distances between features.
What challenges second-order relationship theories?
Stretching or squashing faces maintains recognizability, but negative faces, despite preserving configural information, are difficult to recognize (Hole et al., 1999, 2002).
Where does face processing occur in the brain?
It is widely distributed but has core regions in the superior temporal sulcus and inferior temporal cortex, where face-selective neurons are found.
What do hierarchical theories suggest about face recognition?
Early visual cortex processes basic features like lines and colors, which are combined in the inferior temporal cortex to detect complex stimuli like faces.
What are the main strengths of the Bruce and Young and IAC models?
The Bruce and Young model provides a foundational understanding of face processing, while the IAC model captures phenomena like semantic and repetition priming.
