Skip to main content
SpringerLink
Log in

Face processing in humans and new world monkeys: the influence of experiential and ecological factors

  • Original Article
  • Published:
Animal Cognition Aims and scope Submit manuscript

Abstract

This study tests whether the face-processing system of humans and a nonhuman primate species share characteristics that would allow for early and quick processing of socially salient stimuli: a sensitivity toward conspecific faces, a sensitivity toward highly practiced face stimuli, and an ability to generalize changes in the face that do not suggest a new identity, such as a face differently oriented. The look rates by adult tamarins and humans toward conspecific and other primate faces were examined to determine if these characteristics are shared. A visual paired comparison (VPC) task presented subjects with either a human face, chimpanzee face, tamarin face, or an object as a sample, and then a pair containing the previous stimulus and a novel stimulus was presented. The stimuli were either presented all in an upright orientation, or all in an inverted orientation. The novel stimulus in the pair was either an orientation change of the same face/object or a new example of the same type of face/object, and the stimuli were shown either in an upright orientation or in an inverted orientation. Preference to novelty scores revealed that humans attended most to novel individual human faces, and this effect decreased significantly if the stimuli were inverted. Tamarins showed preferential looking toward novel orientations of previously seen tamarin faces in the upright orientation, but not in an inverted orientation. Similarly, their preference to look longer at novel tamarin and human faces within the pair was reduced significantly with inverted stimuli. The results confirmed prior findings in humans that novel human faces generate more attention in the upright than in the inverted orientation. The monkeys also attended more to faces of conspecifics, but showed an inversion effect to orientation change in tamarin faces and to identity changes in tamarin and human faces. The results indicate configural processing restricted to particular kinds of primate faces by a New World monkey species, with configural processing influenced by life experience (human faces and tamarin faces) and specialized to process orientation changes specific to conspecific faces.

This is a preview of subscription content, log in via an institution to check access.

Access this article

Log in via an institution

Price excludes VAT (USA)
Tax calculation will be finalised during checkout.

Instant access to the full article PDF.

Institutional subscriptions

Fig. 1
Fig. 2

Similar content being viewed by others

Notes

  1. The alpha level was adjusted to account for six comparisons between the four conditions, or 0.05/6 or 0.00833.

References

  • Cashon CH, Cohen LB (2003) The construction, deconstruction, and reconstruction of infant face perception. In: Pascalis O, Slater P (eds) The development of face processing in infancy and early childhood: current perspectives. Nova Science, New York, pp 55–68

    Google Scholar 

  • Desimone R (1991) Face-selective cells in the temporal cortex of monkeys. J Cogn Neurosci 3:1–8

    Google Scholar 

  • Desimone R, Albright TD, Gross CG, Bruce C (1984) Stimulus-selective properties of inferior temporal neurons in the macaque. J Neurosci 4:2051–2062

    PubMed  CAS  Google Scholar 

  • Diamond R, Carey S (1986) Why faces are and are not special: an effect of expertise. J Exp Psychol Gen 115:107–117

    Article  PubMed  CAS  Google Scholar 

  • Ellis HD, Shephard JW (1975) Recognition of upright and inverted faces in the left and right visual fields. Cortex 11:3–7

    PubMed  CAS  Google Scholar 

  • Farah MJ (1990) Visual agnosia: disorders of object recognition and what they tell us about normal vision. MIT Press, Cambridge, MA

    Google Scholar 

  • Frick J, Colombo J, Allen JR (2000) Temporal sequence of global-local processing in 3-month-old infants. Infancy 1:375–386

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Gauthier I, Logothetis NK (2000) Is face recognition not so unique after all? Cogn Neuropsychol 17:125–142

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Gauthier I, Tarr MJ (1997) Becoming a “Greeble” expert: exploring the face recognition mechanism. Vis Res 37:1673–1682

    Article  PubMed  CAS  Google Scholar 

  • Gauthier I, Skudlarski P, Gore JC, Anderson AW (2000) Expertise for cars and birds recruits brain areas involved in face recognition. Nat Neurol 3:191–197

    Article  CAS  Google Scholar 

  • Ghazanfar AA, Santos LR (2004) Primate brains in the wild: the sensory bases for social interactions. Nat Neurosci 5:603–616

    Article  CAS  Google Scholar 

  • Gothard KM, Erickson CA, Amaral DG (2004) How do rhesus monkeys (Macaca mulatta) scan faces in a visual paired comparison task? Anim Cogn 7:25–36

    Article  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  • Gunderson VM, Swartz KB (1985) Visual recognition in infant pigtailed macaques after a 24-hour delay. Am J Primatol 8:259–264

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Johnson MH, Dziurawiec S, Ellis H, Morton J (1991) Newborn's preferential tracking of face-like stimuli and its subsequent decline. Cognition 40:1–19

    Article  PubMed  CAS  Google Scholar 

  • McCarthy G, Puce A, Gore JC, Allison T (1997) Face-specific processing in the human fusiform gyrus. J Cogn Neurosci 9:605–610

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Neiworth JJ, Anders SL, Parsons RR (2001) Tracking responses related to self-recognition: a frequency comparison of responses to mirrors, photographs, and videotape of monkeys by cotton top tamarins (Saguinus oedipus). J Comp Psychol 115:432–438

    Article  PubMed  CAS  Google Scholar 

  • Neiworth JJ, Burman MA, Basile BM, Lickteig MT (2002) Use of experimenter-given cues in visual co-orienting and in an object-choice task by a new world monkey species, cotton top tamarins (Saguinus oedipus). J Comp Psychol 116:3–11

    Article  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  • Neiworth JJ, Steinmark E, Basile BM, Wonders R, Steely F, DeHart C (2003) A test of object permanence in a new-world monkey species, cotton top tamarins (Saguinus oedipus). Anim Cogn 6:27–37

    PubMed  Google Scholar 

  • Neiworth JJ, Parsons RR, Hassett JM (2004) A test of the generality of perceptually based categories found in infants: attentional differences toward natural kinds by New World monkeys. Dev Sci 7:185–193

    Article  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  • Parr LA, Dove TA, Hopkins WD (1998) Why faces may be special: evidence of the inversion effect in chimpanzees (Pan troglodytes). J Cogn Neurosci 10:615–622

    Article  PubMed  CAS  Google Scholar 

  • Parr LA, Winslow JT, Hopkins WD (1999) Is the inversion effect in rhesus monkeys face-specific? Anim Cogn 2:123–129

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Pascalis O, Bachevalier J (1998) Face recognition in primates: a cross-species study. Behav Proc 43:87–96

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Pascalis O, deHaan M, Nelson CA (2002) Is face processing species-specific during the first year of life? Science 296:1321–1322

    Article  PubMed  CAS  Google Scholar 

  • Perrett DI, Rolls ET, Caan W (1982) Visual neurons responsive to faces in the monkey temporal cortex. Exp Brain Res 47:329–342

    Article  PubMed  CAS  Google Scholar 

  • Perrett DI, Smith PAG, Potter DD, Mistlin AJ, Head AS, Milner AD, Jeeves MA (1985) Visual cells in the temporal cortex sensitive to face view and gaze direction. Proc Trans R Soc Lond Ser B 223:293–317

    Article  CAS  Google Scholar 

  • Perrett DI, Mistlin AJ, Chitty AJ, Smith PAJ, Potter DD, Broennimann R, Harries M (1988) Specialized face processing and hemispheric asymmetry in man and monkey: evidence from single unit and reaction time studies. Behav Brain Res 29:245–258

    Article  PubMed  CAS  Google Scholar 

  • Pascalis O, de Schonen S, Morton J, Deruelle C, Fabre-Grenet H (1995) Mother's face recognition by neonates: a replication and an extension. Infant Behav Dev 18:79–85

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Phelps MT, Roberts WA (1994) Memory for pictures of upright and inverted primate faces in humans (Homo sapiens), squirrel monkeys (Saimiri sciureus), and pigeons (Columba livia). J Comp Psychol 108:114–125

    Article  PubMed  CAS  Google Scholar 

  • Philips RJ, Rawles RE (1979) Recognition of upright and inverted faces: a correlational study. Perception 8:577–583

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Pinsk MA, Desimone K, Moore T, Gross CG, Kastner S (2005) Representations of faces and body parts in macaque temporal cortex: a functional MRI study. Proc Natl Acad Sci USA 102:6996–7001

    Article  PubMed  CAS  Google Scholar 

  • Rolls ET (1984) Neurons in the cortex of the temporal lobe and in the amygdala of the monkey with responses selective for faces. Hum Neurobiol 3:209–222

    PubMed  CAS  Google Scholar 

  • Slater A, Quinn PC (2001) Face recognition in the newborn infant. Infant Child Dev 10:21–24

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Snowdon CT, Cleveland J, French JA (1983) Responses to context- and individual-specific cues in cotton-top tamarin long calls. Anim Behav 31:92–101

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Tsao DY, Freiwald WA, Knutsen TA, Mandeville JB, Tottell RBH (2003) Faces and objects in macaque cerebral cortex. Nat Neurosci 6:989–995

    Article  PubMed  CAS  Google Scholar 

  • Tsao DY, Freiwald WA, Tootell RBH, Livingstone MS (2006) A cortical region consisting entirely of face-selective cells. Science 3:670–674

    Article  CAS  Google Scholar 

  • Weiss DJ, Kralik JD, Hauser MD (2001) Face processing in cotton-top tamarins (Saguinus oedipus). Anim Cogn 4:191–205

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Wright AA, Roberts WA (1996) Monkey and human face perception: inversion effects for human faces but not for monkey faces or scenes. J Cogn Neurol 8:278–290

    Google Scholar 

Download references

Acknowledgment

The research presented here was funded by NIH grant 1 R15 MH62434-01A1 to Julie J. Neiworth.

Author information

Authors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Psychology, Carleton College, Northfield, MN, 55057, USA

    Julie J. Neiworth, Janice M. Hassett & Cara J. Sylvester

Authors
  1. Julie J. Neiworth
    View author publications

    You can also search for this author in PubMed Google Scholar

  2. Janice M. Hassett
    View author publications

    You can also search for this author in PubMed Google Scholar

  3. Cara J. Sylvester
    View author publications

    You can also search for this author in PubMed Google Scholar

Corresponding author

Correspondence to Julie J. Neiworth.

Rights and permissions

Reprints and permissions

About this article

Cite this article

Neiworth, J.J., Hassett, J.M. & Sylvester, C.J. Face processing in humans and new world monkeys: the influence of experiential and ecological factors. Anim Cogn 10, 125–134 (2007). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10071-006-0045-4

Download citation

  • Received:

  • Revised:

  • Accepted:

  • Published:

  • Issue Date:

  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s10071-006-0045-4

Keywords

Search

Navigation