Understanding early development of perception of facial impressions

2018 Fiscal Year Final Research Report

• Project/Area Number: 15K04192
• Research Category: Grant-in-Aid for Scientific Research (C)
• Allocation Type: Multi-year Fund
• Section: 一般
• Research Field: Experimental psychology
• Research Institution: Jissen Women's University
• Principal Investigator: Sakuta Yuiko 実践女子大学, 生活科学部, 講師 (30454078)
• Project Period (FY): 2015-04-01 – 2019-03-31
• Keywords: 顔認知 / 社会的認知 / 発達 / 印象

Outline of Final Research Achievements

First, we examined 5-to-8-month-old infants' perception of facial impressions by preferential-looking paradigm. As a result, it was found that even infants pay attention to facial images that adults judge to be "trustworthy." These results were published in the international journal (Sakuta et al., 2018, PLOS ONE). Next, impression judgment experiments were conducted for 3-to-6-year-old children and adults. The results showed that some impressions were quite similar, but the other ones were different between children and adults. These results were presented at an international conference (Sakuta, 2019, ICPS) and are currently being prepared for submission to a journal.
There have been few studies regarding young children's impression judgment. This study suggests that infants can obtain the ability to detect trustworthiness from the face through a small number of social experiences after birth.

Free Research Field

認知心理学

Academic Significance and Societal Importance of the Research Achievements

本研究で得られた知見を総合すると、顔から印象を知覚する能力は多くの社会的経験や複雑な社会的相互作用を必要としないことが推測される。社会の中で生きる上で、他者が自分にとって味方となりそうか等を評価する能力は非常に重要かつ基本的なスキルであるが、これまでその発達過程についてはほとんど解明されていない。本研究課題により、顔認知の重要な側面である印象知覚のメカニズムの解明に大きく寄与することができたと考える。