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Search templates that incorporate within-face variation improve visual search for faces

ABSTRACT: Searching for unfamiliar faces in crowds is an important task in modern society. In surveillance and security settings, it is sometimes critical to locate a target individual quickly and accurately. In this study, we examine whether we can improve search efficiency in these visual search tasks by changing the face information that is provided to participants. In Experiment 1, we compare speed and accuracy of visual search when searching for unfamiliar and familiar faces after being exposed to either a single exemplar image or a face average created from multiple images of the target face. In Experiment 2, we compare search efficiency when single exemplars and multiple exemplars are provided. Consistent with studies of unfamiliar face matching tasks, we find that, relative to a single image, having multiple images of the target improves the accuracy of visual search. In Experiment 3, we compared search performance for face averages and multiple exemplars while also varying crowd size. Multiple exemplars conferred an additional advantage over face averages, suggesting that exposure to within-face variability results in the best search performance. We discuss the implications of these findings for face-in-a-crowd search and visual search tasks more generally.

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The online version of this article (10.1186/s41235-018-0128-1) contains supplementary material, which is available to authorized users.

SUBMITTER: Dunn J

PROVIDER: S-EPMC6156691 | biostudies-literature | 2018 Sep

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature

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Project description:Background: The concept of alexithymia is characterized by difficulties identifying and describing one's emotions. Alexithymic individuals are impaired in the recognition of others' emotional facial expressions. Alexithymia is quite common in patients suffering from major depressive disorder. The face-in-the-crowd task is a visual search paradigm that assesses processing of multiple facial emotions. In the present eye-tracking study, the relationship between alexithymia and visual processing of facial emotions was examined in clinical depression. Materials and Methods: Gaze behavior and manual response times of 20 alexithymic and 19 non-alexithymic depressed patients were compared in a face-in-the-crowd task. Alexithymia was empirically measured via the 20-item Toronto Alexithymia-Scale. Angry, happy, and neutral facial expressions of different individuals were shown as target and distractor stimuli. Our analyses of gaze behavior focused on latency to the target face, number of distractor faces fixated before fixating the target, number of target fixations, and number of distractor faces fixated after fixating the target. Results: Alexithymic patients exhibited in general slower decision latencies compared to non-alexithymic patients in the face-in-the-crowd task. Patient groups did not differ in latency to target, number of target fixations, and number of distractors fixated prior to target fixation. However, after having looked at the target, alexithymic patients fixated more distractors than non-alexithymic patients, regardless of expression condition. Discussion: According to our results, alexithymia goes along with impairments in visual processing of multiple facial emotions in clinical depression. Alexithymia appears to be associated with delayed manual reaction times and prolonged scanning after the first target fixation in depression, but it might have no impact on the early search phase. The observed deficits could indicate difficulties in target identification and/or decision-making when processing multiple emotional facial expressions. Impairments of alexithymic depressed patients in processing emotions in crowds of faces seem not limited to a specific affective valence. In group situations, alexithymic depressed patients might be slowed in processing interindividual differences in emotional expressions compared with non-alexithymic depressed patients. This could represent a disadvantage in understanding non-verbal communication in groups.

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Search templates that incorporate within-face variation improve visual search for faces

Electronic supplementary material

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