Development Of Visual Preference For Own-versus Other-race Faces In Infancy

Experience plays a critical role of the emergence of the visual preference for own-versusother-race faces in Infancy. Evidence from last decade suggests that3-month-old infants preferown-race faces to other-race faces. It is entirely unknown whether infants beyond3months ofage will continue to show a preference for own-race faces relative to other-race faces and howthe scanning patterns develop with age. We showed own-vs. other-race face pairs to3-,6-, and9-month-old Chinese infants (N=103) used eye tracking methodology to analyze their visualscanning patterns. Three eye movement indexes (fixation duration, fixation spots, and scan paths)were examined.The findings suggest that (a) In contrast with3-month-olds’ visual preference for own-racefaces,6-month-olds demonstrated no spontaneous preference for faces from either their own-orother-race groups and9-month-olds preferentially looked more at the other-race faces.(b) In the development of visual preference for own-versus other-race faces in infancy, thedevelopment of scan pattern of own-race faces was the same for the other-race faces, it occurredat a later age.First,3-month-old infants spent significantly more fixation time on the internal features ofown-race faces. With increased age, infants increasingly spent more fixation time on the internalfeatures of other-race faces, so6-, and9-month-old infants demonstrated no overall fixation timedifference between same race and other race for the internal features.Second,3-, and6-month-old infants scanned more frequently on internal features ofown-race faces, with increased age, infants became increasingly scanned on internal features of-race faces, and9-month-old infants demonstrated no scanning frequencies difference betweensame race and other race for the internal featuresThird， the fixation distributions between own-and other-race faces are different,3-month-old infants fixated significantly more on the left eye region of own-race faces. However, with age, infants tended to direct their fixations more toward the nasal bridge and away from theleft eye of the own-race faces. In contrast, infants tended to direct their fixations more toward theleft eye nasal bridge and away from the nasal bridge of the other-race faces. The scan pattern ofown-race faces was the same for the other-race faces, it occurred at9-month-old.(c) The saliency analyses suggested that infants’ differential scan patterns of own-versusother-race faces cannot be explained by difference in perceptual salienc y of the face images,which may conformed to the enculturation hypothesis.