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Revealing the neural representations underlying other-race face perception.
Moaz Shoura1, Yong Z Liang1, Marco A Sama1
1Department of Psychology at Scarborough, University of Toronto, Toronto, ON, Canada.
Frontiers in Human Neuroscience
|March 20, 2025
Summary
The other-race effect (ORE) shows people recognize same-race faces better than other-race faces. This study reveals neural evidence linking ORE to compressed face representations and visual biases in perception.
Area of Science:
- Cognitive Neuroscience
- Social Psychology
- Neuroscience
Background:
- The other-race effect (ORE) describes the phenomenon of reduced accuracy in recognizing faces from different racial groups compared to one's own.
- Understanding the neural underpinnings of ORE is crucial for addressing its cognitive and social implications.
Purpose of the Study:
- To investigate the neural and representational basis of the other-race effect (ORE) in East Asian and White participants.
- To explore the temporal dynamics and individual variability of ORE at the neural level.
- To reveal visual biases associated with other-race face perception using image reconstruction.
Main Methods:
- Utilized electroencephalography (EEG) for behavioral measures, neural decoding, and image reconstruction.
- Analyzed data from East Asian and White participants to compare recognition accuracy and neural patterns for same-race versus other-race faces.
- Employed a data-driven image reconstruction approach to visualize perceptual biases.
Main Results:
- Identified a neural correlate of ORE characterized by reduced decoding accuracy for other-race faces.
- Found evidence that ORE is associated with a higher density of other-race face representations within the neural 'face space'.
- Revealed systematic visual biases in perceiving other-race faces as more typical, younger, and more expressive.
Conclusions:
- Neural evidence supports the face space compression account of ORE, where other-race faces occupy a denser representation.
- ORE involves not only diminished identity information but also significant distortions in visual representation.
- Findings highlight the complex interplay between perception, representation, and social cognition in the other-race effect.
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