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. 2019 Feb 28;10(1):2041669519830414.
doi: 10.1177/2041669519830414. eCollection 2019 Jan-Feb.

Sex Categorization of Faces: The Effects of Age and Experience

Anne Hillairet de Boisferon  1 , Eve Dupierrix  2 , Lesley Uttley  3 , Lisa M DeBruine  4 , Benedict C Jones  4 , Olivier Pascalis  5
Affiliations

Sex Categorization of Faces: The Effects of Age and Experience

Anne Hillairet de Boisferon et al. Iperception. .

Abstract

The face own-age bias effect refers to the better ability to recognize the face from one's own age compared with other age groups. Here we examined whether an own-age advantage occurs for faces sex categorization. We examined 7- and 9-year-olds' and adults' ability to correctly categorize the sex of 7- and 9-year-olds and adult faces without external cues, such as hair. Results indicated that all ages easily classify the sex of adult faces. They succeeded in classifying the sex of child faces, but their performance was poorer than for adult faces. In adults, processing time increased, and a response bias (male response) was elicited for child faces. In children, response times remained constant, and no bias was observed. Experience with specific category of faces seems to offer some advantage in speed of processing. Overall, sex categorization is more challenging for child than for adult faces due to their reduced sexual dimorphic facial characteristics.

Keywords: experience; face categorization; own-age bias; sex discrimination.

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Figures

Figure 1.
Figure 1.
Examples of male and female stimuli for each age of faces condition.
Figure 2.
Figure 2.
(a) Mean A′ scores (±SEs) and (b) mean RTs (±SEs) for sex categorization of all age of faces for all participant age groups.
Figure 3.
Figure 3.
Mean response bias measure C (±SEs) for sex categorization of all age of faces for all participant age groups.
See this image and copyright information in PMC

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How to cite this article

    1. Hillairet de Boisferon A., Dupierrix E., Uttley L., DeBruine L. M., Jones B. C., Pascalis O. (2019) Sex categorization of faces: The effects of age and experience. i-Perception 10(1): 1–13. doi: 10.1177/2041669519830414. - PMC - PubMed