Revisiting the perception of upside-down faces.

Area of Science:

• Cognitive Psychology
• Visual Perception
• Neuroscience

Background:

• Face perception is a fundamental cognitive ability.
• The orientation of a face significantly influences its recognition and processing.
• Previous research suggests holistic processing for upright faces versus feature-based processing for inverted faces.

Purpose of the Study:

• To investigate the differential effects of orientation on face perception.
• To examine how changes in spatial-relational and component properties affect bizarreness ratings at various orientations.
• To provide evidence for distinct processing mechanisms for upright and inverted faces.

Main Methods:

• Two experiments were conducted assessing face perception.
• Participants rated the bizarreness of unaltered faces and faces with altered spatial-relational (e.g., inverted eyes/mouth) or component properties.
• Faces were presented at orientations ranging from 0 to 180 degrees.

Main Results:

• Bizarreness ratings for unaltered and component-distorted faces increased linearly with orientation (0-180 degrees).
• Spatial-distortion faces showed a discontinuity in bizarreness ratings between 90 and 120 degrees of orientation.
• Inversion had a disproportionate effect on the encoding of spatial-relational information.

Conclusions:

• A qualitative difference exists in the processing of upright and inverted faces.
• Spatial-relational information is critically affected by face inversion.
• Findings support models of face perception that differentiate processing based on orientation.