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Updated: Mar 24, 2026

Perceptual and Category Processing of the Uncanny Valley Hypothesis' Dimension of Human Likeness: Some Methodological Issues
Published on: June 3, 2013
The face is the thing: Faces, not emotions, are responsible for chimeric perceptual asymmetry
McKensie M Worley1, David B Boles1
1a Department of Psychology , University of Alabama , Tuscaloosa , AL , USA.
Abstract:
We used factor analysis to examine relationships among tasks that have previously shown right hemispheric processing asymmetries. We were interested in whether processing emotion displayed by a face constitutes a distinct perceptual process from processing other facial characteristics. Interest in this topic arose after Boles [ 1991 . Factor analysis and the cerebral hemispheres: Pilot study and parietal functions. Neuropsychologia, 29 ( 1 ), 59 - 91 ] found evidence of a common process underlying face processing and then Boles [ 1992 . Factor analysis and the cerebral hemispheres: Temporal, occipital and frontal functions. Neuropsychologia, 30 ( 11 ), 963 - 988 ] found evidence of a distinct process for the processing of the facial emotion. We used seven tasks that measured both face and non-face perception. Analysis of the asymmetries revealed measures from the five face tasks resulted in a single factor, thus failing to support the hypothesis that emotional face perception would involve a separate process from non-emotional face perception. A second factor revealed a separate process underlying enumeration, and a third factor revealed yet another process underlying line bisection. The results indicate that perceiving facial emotion results in right hemisphere processing, and faces as a whole are responsible for such processing.
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