Preferences for Processing Facial Information at Different Orientations in Individuals With Developmental Prosopagnosia
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Updated: Mar 25, 2026

Conscious and Non-conscious Representations of Emotional Faces in Asperger's Syndrome
Published on: July 31, 2016
Jialin Ma1, Xiaojie Wang1, Rui Zhang2
1Facuty of Education, School of Psychology, Henan University, Kaifeng, Henan, China.
Background:
Research has shown that individuals with developmental prosopagnosia (DP) may present a horizontal preference (a preference for horizontal structure) when processing faces. This preference may lead DP individuals to focus on horizontal facial information and ignore other information.
Methods:
Experiment 1 explored whether there was a difference in horizontal preference between the DP group (N = 27) and the control group (N = 47) and whether this preference was based on facial rotation or low-level horizontal (vertical) information. Experiments 2a and 2b used behavioral and eye-movement techniques to explore whether the DP (N = 73) and control groups (N = 58) had preferences for horizontal (vertical) configuration.
Results:
Experiment 1: The results showed that the control group and DP group preferred the horizontal feature information (this preference was not affected by rotation orientation) of faces. Experiments 2a and 2b: The results showed that the DP group had a preference for vertical configuration, while the control group had a preference for horizontal configuration.
Conclusions:
In summary, the control group and the DP group preferred low-level horizontal facial information, and these preferences were not affected by facial rotation orientation. However, regarding spacing configuration, the control group preferred a horizontal configuration, whereas the DP group preferred a vertical configuration. This finding is crucial for elucidating the face preferences in individuals with DP and deepening the comprehension of the associated cognitive-behavioral patterns.
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