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Gemignani M, Giannotti M, Rigo P, Venuti P, de Falco S. Neither Parents' Sex Nor the Type of Family Modulates Attentional Bias Toward Infant Faces: A Preliminary Study in Different-Sex and Same-Sex Parents. ARCHIVES OF SEXUAL BEHAVIOR 2024; 53:2053-2061. [PMID: 38811490 PMCID: PMC11176217 DOI: 10.1007/s10508-024-02875-9] [Citation(s) in RCA: 0] [Impact Index Per Article: 0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [MESH Headings] [Grants] [Track Full Text] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 08/23/2023] [Revised: 04/17/2024] [Accepted: 04/18/2024] [Indexed: 05/31/2024]
Abstract
An attentional bias toward infant versus adult faces has been detected in parents and positively associated with sensitive caregiving behaviors. In previous research, the attentional bias has been measured as the difference in attention, in terms of reaction times, captured by infant versus adult faces; the larger the difference, the greater the cognitive engagement that adults deployed to infant faces. However, research so far has been mostly confined to samples of mothers, who have been more represented than fathers. Moreover, new family forms, especially same-sex families of men, have been left out of research. To clarify potential sex differences and extend previous findings to diverse family forms, we implemented a modified Go/no-Go attentional task measuring attentional bias to infant faces in parents with children aged from 2 to 36 months. The sample (N = 86) was matched and included 22 fathers and 22 mothers from different-sex families and 20 fathers and 22 mothers from same-sex families. Overall, the results confirmed that infant faces induced a greater attentional bias compared to adult faces. Moreover, we found that neither the type of family nor parents' sex modulated the attentional bias toward infant faces. The findings are discussed in relation to the importance of understanding the correlates of parental response to infant cues going beyond a heteronormative perspective on parenting.
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Affiliation(s)
- Micol Gemignani
- Department of Psychology and Cognitive Science, University of Trento, Corso Bettini 84, 38068, Rovereto, TN, Italy.
| | - Michele Giannotti
- Department of Psychology and Cognitive Science, University of Trento, Corso Bettini 84, 38068, Rovereto, TN, Italy
| | - Paola Rigo
- Department of Developmental Psychology and Socialisation, University of Padua, Padua, PD, Italy
| | - Paola Venuti
- Department of Psychology and Cognitive Science, University of Trento, Corso Bettini 84, 38068, Rovereto, TN, Italy
| | - Simona de Falco
- Department of Psychology and Cognitive Science, University of Trento, Corso Bettini 84, 38068, Rovereto, TN, Italy
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Gemignani M, Giannotti M, Rigo P, de Falco S. Attentional bias to infant faces might be associated with previous care experiences and involvement in childcare in same-sex mothers. Int J Clin Health Psychol 2024; 24:100419. [PMID: 37885912 PMCID: PMC10598538 DOI: 10.1016/j.ijchp.2023.100419] [Citation(s) in RCA: 0] [Impact Index Per Article: 0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [Track Full Text] [Figures] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 06/08/2023] [Accepted: 10/14/2023] [Indexed: 10/28/2023] Open
Abstract
Background Attentional bias toward infant faces is associated with parental sensitivity and supports the infant-caregiver attachment relationship, ultimately fostering child health outcomes. However, experience-related determinants of parents' attentional bias to infant faces have been poorly investigated. We examined attentional bias to infant versus adult faces in a sample of same-sex mothers (N = 76), and whether it varied depending on maternal involvement in childcare and the perceived quality of past experiences of care. Method A Go/no-Go attentional task was used to compare the effects of infant and adult faces in retaining attention. Maternal involvement in childcare was measured using items addressing nurturing behaviors. Memories of past experiences of care were collected using the short-form version of the Parental Acceptance-Rejection scale. Results Results confirmed that infant faces induced greater attentional bias compared to adult faces. More involved mothers were more biased, in terms of attention, to infant versus adult faces. Attentional bias to infant versus adult faces increased as mothers felt more rejected by their own fathers during childhood. Discussion Our findings suggested that attentional bias to infant faces might be associated with past experiences of care and direct commitment in childcare in same-sex mothers. Robust and accurate empirical findings on same-sex parent families are essential to inform social policies supporting these families' well being.
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Affiliation(s)
- Micol Gemignani
- Department of Psychology and Cognitive Science, University of Trento, Rovereto 38068, TN, Italy
| | - Michele Giannotti
- Department of Psychology and Cognitive Science, University of Trento, Rovereto 38068, TN, Italy
| | - Paola Rigo
- Department of Developmental Psychology and Socialisation, University of Padova, Padova 35131, PD, Italy
| | - Simona de Falco
- Department of Psychology and Cognitive Science, University of Trento, Rovereto 38068, TN, Italy
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Gemignani M, Giannotti M, Schmalz X, Rigo P, De Falco S. Attentional Prioritization of Infant Faces in Parents: The Influence of Parents' Experiences of Care. INTERNATIONAL JOURNAL OF ENVIRONMENTAL RESEARCH AND PUBLIC HEALTH 2022; 20:527. [PMID: 36612848 PMCID: PMC9819530 DOI: 10.3390/ijerph20010527] [Citation(s) in RCA: 0] [Impact Index Per Article: 0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [MESH Headings] [Track Full Text] [Figures] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 10/20/2022] [Revised: 12/19/2022] [Accepted: 12/22/2022] [Indexed: 06/17/2023]
Abstract
Infant faces are prioritized by the attentional system in parents, resulting in a greater cognitive engagement in terms of response time. However, many biological, contextual and environmental factors relating to this cognitive mechanism have been left unexplored. To fill this gap, this study aims to (i) confirm that infant faces engage more attention compared to adult faces; (ii) investigate whether the attention to infant faces is affected early care experiences of parents; (iii) explore the effect of parents' sex by taking the amount of involvement with early childcare into consideration. 51 mothers and 46 fathers completed a modified Go/no-Go task, a brief sociodemographic questionnaire, the short version of the Adult Parental Acceptance-Rejection scale, and an ad-hoc question relating to the amount of parental involvement with early childcare. Parents' response times were slowed in the presence of infant versus adult faces. Parents whose mother was perceived as more sensitively accepting were more engaged by infant cues. By considering the amount of early parental involvement, the sex of parents did not significantly interact with the type of face. These findings provide new insights on the attention process in response to infant cues in parents and suggest that the investigation of experience-based factors may shed further light on this topic.
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Affiliation(s)
- Micol Gemignani
- Department of Psychology and Cognitive Science, University of Trento, Corso Bettini 84, 38068 Rovereto, Italy
| | - Michele Giannotti
- Department of Psychology and Cognitive Science, University of Trento, Corso Bettini 84, 38068 Rovereto, Italy
| | - Xenia Schmalz
- Department of Child and Adolescent Psychiatry, Psychosomatics and Psychotherapy, University Hospital, LMU Munich, 80336 Munich, Germany
| | - Paola Rigo
- Department of Developmental Psychology and Socialisation, University of Padua, 35131 Padua, Italy
| | - Simona De Falco
- Department of Psychology and Cognitive Science, University of Trento, Corso Bettini 84, 38068 Rovereto, Italy
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Association and dissociation between detection and discrimination of objects of expertise: Evidence from visual search. Atten Percept Psychophys 2013; 76:391-406. [DOI: 10.3758/s13414-013-0562-6] [Citation(s) in RCA: 16] [Impact Index Per Article: 1.5] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Indexed: 11/08/2022]
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Devue C, Belopolsky AV, Theeuwes J. Oculomotor guidance and capture by irrelevant faces. PLoS One 2012; 7:e34598. [PMID: 22506033 PMCID: PMC3323541 DOI: 10.1371/journal.pone.0034598] [Citation(s) in RCA: 29] [Impact Index Per Article: 2.4] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [MESH Headings] [Track Full Text] [Download PDF] [Figures] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 11/23/2011] [Accepted: 03/07/2012] [Indexed: 11/19/2022] Open
Abstract
Even though it is generally agreed that face stimuli constitute a special class of stimuli, which are treated preferentially by our visual system, it remains unclear whether faces can capture attention in a stimulus-driven manner. Moreover, there is a long-standing debate regarding the mechanism underlying the preferential bias of selecting faces. Some claim that faces constitute a set of special low-level features to which our visual system is tuned; others claim that the visual system is capable of extracting the meaning of faces very rapidly, driving attentional selection. Those debates continue because many studies contain methodological peculiarities and manipulations that prevent a definitive conclusion. Here, we present a new visual search task in which observers had to make a saccade to a uniquely colored circle while completely irrelevant objects were also present in the visual field. The results indicate that faces capture and guide the eyes more than other animated objects and that our visual system is not only tuned to the low-level features that make up a face but also to its meaning.
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Affiliation(s)
- Christel Devue
- Cognitive Psychology, Vrije Universiteit Amsterdam, Amsterdam, The Netherlands.
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Atypical disengagement from faces and its modulation by the control of eye fixation in children with autism spectrum disorder. J Autism Dev Disord 2011; 41:629-45. [PMID: 20714799 DOI: 10.1007/s10803-010-1082-z] [Citation(s) in RCA: 40] [Impact Index Per Article: 3.1] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Indexed: 10/19/2022]
Abstract
By using the gap overlap task, we investigated disengagement from faces and objects in children (9-17 years old) with and without autism spectrum disorder (ASD) and its neurophysiological correlates. In typically developing (TD) children, faces elicited larger gap effect, an index of attentional engagement, and larger saccade-related event-related potentials (ERPs), compared to objects. In children with ASD, by contrast, neither gap effect nor ERPs differ between faces and objects. Follow-up experiments demonstrated that instructed fixation on the eyes induces larger gap effect for faces in children with ASD, whereas instructed fixation on the mouth can disrupt larger gap effect in TD children. These results suggest a critical role of eye fixation on attentional engagement to faces in both groups.
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Pearson RM, Lightman SL, Evans J. The impact of breastfeeding on mothers' attentional sensitivity towards infant distress. Infant Behav Dev 2010; 34:200-5. [PMID: 21185606 DOI: 10.1016/j.infbeh.2010.12.009] [Citation(s) in RCA: 24] [Impact Index Per Article: 1.7] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 06/13/2010] [Revised: 10/06/2010] [Accepted: 12/03/2010] [Indexed: 02/03/2023]
Abstract
BACKGROUND Maternal response towards infant distress has an important impact on infant development. In animals it is established that lactation and pup suckling plays an important role in maintaining maternal responses. Previous research suggests that breastfeeding is associated with sensitive maternal responses in human mothers. However, this may be because women who are more sensitive to their infant choose to breastfeed. The current study investigated the attentional sensitivity towards infant distress in women who went on to breast or formula feed during pregnancy as well as after birth. We hypothesised that differences in breast and formula feeding mothers would only emerge after birth once feeding had commenced. METHOD Women were recruited during pregnancy through community midwives as part of a longitudinal study. 51 women were seen during late pregnancy and between 3 and 6 months after birth (27 were breast and 24 were formula feeding). Sensitivity to infant distress was measured as the extent of women's attentional bias towards infant distress stimuli. RESULTS After birth, we found that our index of attentional bias towards infant distress was 37 ms (0.5 S.D.s) (CI; 6-69, p = 0.021) higher in breastfeeding compared to formula feeding mothers. However, mothers who went on to breastfeed did not show greater attentional bias towards infant distress already during late pregnancy. CONCLUSIONS Our results suggest that the act of breastfeeding may influence mothers' attentional sensitivity towards infant distress. Previous research suggests breastfeeding is indicative of sensitive parenting. The current findings may suggest a mechanism by which breastfeeding and/or associated infant interaction could contribute to this sensitivity.
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Affiliation(s)
- R M Pearson
- Academic Unit of Psychiatry, University of Bristol, Cotham House, Cotham Hill, Bristol, UK.
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Pearson RM, Cooper RM, Penton-Voak IS, Lightman SL, Evans J. Depressive symptoms in early pregnancy disrupt attentional processing of infant emotion. Psychol Med 2010; 40:621-631. [PMID: 19671214 DOI: 10.1017/s0033291709990961] [Citation(s) in RCA: 89] [Impact Index Per Article: 6.4] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [MESH Headings] [Grants] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Submit a Manuscript] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Indexed: 11/05/2022]
Abstract
BACKGROUND Growing evidence suggests that perinatal depression is associated with disrupted mother-infant interactions and poor infant outcomes. Antenatal depression may play a key role in this cycle by disrupting the development of a maternal response to infant stimuli. The current study therefore investigated the impact of depressive symptoms on the basic cognitive processing of infant stimuli at the beginning of pregnancy. METHOD A total of 101 women were recruited by community midwives and tested at an average gestation of 11 weeks. An established computerized paradigm measured women's ability to disengage attention from infant and adult faces displaying negative positive and neutral emotions. Depressive symptoms were measured using a computerized interview (the Clinical Interview Schedule). RESULTS The effect of infant emotion on women's ability to disengage from infant faces was found to be influenced by depressive symptoms. Non-depressed pregnant women took longer to disengage attention from distressed compared with non-distressed infant faces. This bias was not, however, seen in women experiencing depressive symptoms. There was a difference of -53 (s.d.=0.7) ms (95% confidence interval -90 to -14, p=0.007) between those with and without depressive symptoms in this measure of attentional bias towards distressed infant faces. CONCLUSIONS Our results suggest that depressive symptoms are already associated with differential attentional processing of infant emotion at the very beginning of childbearing. The findings have potential implications for our understanding of the impact of depressive symptoms during pregnancy on the developing mother-infant relationship.
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Affiliation(s)
- R M Pearson
- Academic Unit of Psychiatry, University of Bristol, Bristol BS6 6JL, UK.
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Kikuchi Y, Senju A, Tojo Y, Osanai H, Hasegawa T. Faces do not capture special attention in children with autism spectrum disorder: a change blindness study. Child Dev 2010; 80:1421-33. [PMID: 19765009 DOI: 10.1111/j.1467-8624.2009.01342.x] [Citation(s) in RCA: 56] [Impact Index Per Article: 4.0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Indexed: 11/27/2022]
Abstract
Two experiments investigated attention of children with autism spectrum disorder (ASD) to faces and objects. In both experiments, children (7- to 15-year-olds) detected the difference between 2 visual scenes. Results in Experiment 1 revealed that typically developing children (n = 16) detected the change in faces faster than in objects, whereas children with ASD (n = 16) were equally fast in detecting changes in faces and objects. These results were replicated in Experiment 2 (n = 16 in children with ASD and 22 in typically developing children), which does not require face recognition skill. Results suggest that children with ASD lack an attentional bias toward others' faces, which could contribute to their atypical social orienting.
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Yang CT, Shih CH, Cheng M, Yeh YY. Similarity modulates the face-capturing effect in change detection. VISUAL COGNITION 2009. [DOI: 10.1080/13506280701822991] [Citation(s) in RCA: 0] [Impact Index Per Article: 0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Indexed: 10/22/2022]
Affiliation(s)
- Cheng-Ta Yang
- a Department of Psychology , National Taiwan University , Taipei, Taiwan
| | - Chia-Hao Shih
- a Department of Psychology , National Taiwan University , Taipei, Taiwan
| | - Mindos Cheng
- a Department of Psychology , National Taiwan University , Taipei, Taiwan
| | - Yei-Yu Yeh
- a Department of Psychology , National Taiwan University , Taipei, Taiwan
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Devue C, Laloyaux C, Feyers D, Theeuwes J, Brédart S. Do Pictures of Faces, and Which Ones, Capture Attention in the Inattentional-Blindness Paradigm? Perception 2009; 38:552-68. [DOI: 10.1068/p6049] [Citation(s) in RCA: 50] [Impact Index Per Article: 3.3] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Indexed: 10/20/2022]
Abstract
Faces and self-referential material (eg one's own name) are more likely to capture attention in the inattentional-blindness (IB) paradigm than other stimuli. This effect is presumably due to the meaning of these stimuli rather than to their familiarity [Mack and Rock, 1998 Inattentional Blindness (Cambridge, MA: MIT Press)]. In previous work, IB has been investigated mostly with schematic stimuli. In the present study, the generalisability of this finding was tested with photographic stimuli. In support of the view that faces constitute a special category of stimuli, pictures of faces were found to resist more to IB than pictures of common objects (experiment 1) or than pictures of inverted faces (experiment 2). In a third experiment, the influence of face familiarity and identity (the participant's own face, a friend's face, and an unknown face) on IB rates was evaluated. Unexpectedly, no differential resistence to blindness across these three kinds of faces was found. In conclusion, pictures of faces attracted attention more than pictures of objects or inverted faces in the IB paradigm. However, this effect was not dependent on face familiarity or identity.
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Affiliation(s)
| | | | | | - Jan Theeuwes
- Cognitive Psychology, Vrije Universiteit Amsterdam, Amsterdam, The Netherlands
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Bracco F, Chiorri C. People have the power: priority of socially relevant stimuli in a change detection task. Cogn Process 2008; 10:41-9. [DOI: 10.1007/s10339-008-0246-7] [Citation(s) in RCA: 8] [Impact Index Per Article: 0.5] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 03/25/2008] [Revised: 11/10/2008] [Accepted: 11/12/2008] [Indexed: 11/29/2022]
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Riby DM, Hancock PJB. Do faces capture the attention of individuals with Williams syndrome or autism? Evidence from tracking eye movements. J Autism Dev Disord 2008; 39:421-31. [PMID: 18787936 DOI: 10.1007/s10803-008-0641-z] [Citation(s) in RCA: 168] [Impact Index Per Article: 10.5] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 05/29/2008] [Accepted: 08/12/2008] [Indexed: 11/28/2022]
Abstract
The neuro-developmental disorders of Williams syndrome (WS) and autism can reveal key components of social cognition. Eye-tracking techniques were applied in two tasks exploring attention to pictures containing faces. Images were (i) scrambled pictures containing faces or (ii) pictures of scenes with embedded faces. Compared to individuals who were developing typically, participants with WS and autism showed atypicalities of gaze behaviour. Individuals with WS showed prolonged face gaze across tasks, relating to the typical WS social phenotype. Participants with autism exhibited reduced face gaze, linking to a lack of interest in socially relevant information. The findings are interpreted in terms of wider issues regarding socio-cognition and attention mechanisms.
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Affiliation(s)
- Deborah M Riby
- School of Psychology, Newcastle University, Ridley Building 1, Framlington Place, Newcastle upon Tyne, NE1 7RU, UK.
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Anaki D, Moscovitch M. When a face is (or is not) more than the sum of its features: Configural and analytic processes in facial temporal integration. VISUAL COGNITION 2007. [DOI: 10.1080/13506280601130883] [Citation(s) in RCA: 5] [Impact Index Per Article: 0.3] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Indexed: 10/23/2022]
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Abstract
In this review we examine how attention is involved in detecting faces, recognizing facial identity and registering and discriminating between facial expressions of emotion. The first section examines whether these aspects of face perception are "automatic", in that they are especially rapid, non-conscious, mandatory and capacity-free. The second section discusses whether limited-capacity selective attention mechanisms are preferentially recruited by faces and facial expressions. Evidence from behavioral, neuropsychological, neuroimaging and psychophysiological studies from humans and single-unit recordings from primates is examined and the neural systems involved in processing faces, emotion and attention are highlighted. Avenues for further research are identified.
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Affiliation(s)
- Romina Palermo
- Macquarie Centre for Cognitive Science (MACCS), Macquarie University, NSW 2109, Sydney, Australia.
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Bindemann M, Burton AM, Jenkins R. Capacity limits for face processing. Cognition 2005; 98:177-97. [PMID: 16307958 DOI: 10.1016/j.cognition.2004.11.004] [Citation(s) in RCA: 59] [Impact Index Per Article: 3.1] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [MESH Headings] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 01/28/2004] [Revised: 10/12/2004] [Accepted: 11/22/2004] [Indexed: 11/18/2022]
Abstract
We present three experiments in which subjects were asked to make speeded sex judgements (Experiment 1) or semantic judgements (Experiments 2 and 3) to face targets and nonface items, while ignoring a solitary flanking distractor face or a nonface stimulus. Distractors could be either congruent (same response category) or incongruent (different response category) with the target. Distractor congruency effects were consistently observed in all combinations of target-distractor stimulus pairs, except when a distractor face flanked a target face. The failure to find congruency effects in this condition was explored further in a fourth experiment, in which four task-irrelevant flankers were simultaneously presented. Once again, no face-face congruency effects were found, even though comparison distractors interfered with face and nonface targets alike. However, four simultaneously presented distractor faces did not interfere with nonface targets either. We suggest that these experiments demonstrate a capacity limit for visual processing in these conditions, such that no more than one face is processed at a time.
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Affiliation(s)
- Markus Bindemann
- Department of Psychology, University of Glasgow, Glasgow G12 8QQ, UK.
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Abstract
In the present study, we investigated whether faces have an advantage in retaining attention over other stimulus categories. In three experiments, subjects were asked to focus on a central go/no-go signal before classifying a concurrently presented peripheral line target. In Experiment 1, the go/no-go signal could be superimposed on photographs of upright famous faces, matching inverted faces, or meaningful objects. Experiments 2 and 3 tested upright and inverted unfamiliar faces, printed names, and another class of meaningful objects in an identical design. A fourth experiment provided a replication of Experiment 1, but with a 1,000-msec stimulus onset asynchrony between the onset of the central face/nonface stimuli and the peripheral targets. In all the experiments, the presence of an upright face significantly delayed target response times, in comparison with each of the other stimulus categories. These results suggest a general attentional bias, so that it is particularly difficult to disengage processing resources from faces.
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