scholarly journals Young children learn first impressions of faces through social referencing

2021 ◽  
Vol 11 (1) ◽  
Author(s):  
Adam Eggleston ◽  
Elena Geangu ◽  
Steven P. Tipper ◽  
Richard Cook ◽  
Harriet Over
Keyword(s):  
Young Children ◽  
Cultural Transmission ◽  
Target Face ◽  
Social Referencing ◽  
First Impressions ◽  
Facial Appearance ◽  
Verbal Behaviour

AbstractPrevious research has demonstrated that the tendency to form first impressions from facial appearance emerges early in development. We examined whether social referencing is one route through which these consistent first impressions are acquired. In Study 1, we show that 5- to 7-year-old children are more likely to choose a target face previously associated with positive non-verbal signals as more trustworthy than a face previously associated with negative non-verbal signals. In Study 2, we show that children generalise this learning to novel faces who resemble those who have previously been the recipients of positive non-verbal behaviour. Taken together, these data show one means through which individuals within a community could acquire consistent, and potentially inaccurate, first impressions of others faces. In doing so, they highlight a route through which cultural transmission of first impressions can occur.

scholarly journals Author Correction: Young children learn first impressions of faces through social referencing

2021 ◽  
Vol 11 (1) ◽  
Author(s):  
Adam Eggleston ◽  
Elena Geangu ◽  
Steven P. Tipper ◽  
Richard Cook ◽  
Harriet Over
Keyword(s):  
Young Children ◽  
Social Referencing ◽  
First Impressions

scholarly journals Investigating children as cultural magnets: do young children transmit redundant information along diffusion chains?

2008 ◽  
Vol 363 (1509) ◽  
pp. 3541-3551 ◽  
Author(s):  
Emma Flynn
Keyword(s):  
Young Children ◽  
Cultural Transmission ◽  
The Other ◽  
Specific Reference ◽  
Redundant Information ◽  
Causal Relevance ◽  
Puzzle Box

The primary goal of this study was to investigate cultural transmission in young children, with specific reference to the phenomenon of overimitation. Diffusion chains were used to compare the imitation of 2- and 3-year-olds on a task in which the initial child in each chain performed a series of relevant and irrelevant actions on a puzzle box in order to retrieve a reward. Children in the chains witnessed the actions performed on one of two boxes, one which was transparent and so the lack of causality of the irrelevant actions was obvious, while the other was opaque and so the lack of causal relevance was not obvious. Unlike previous dyadic research in which children overimitate a model, the irrelevant actions were parsed out early in the diffusion chains. Even though children parsed out irrelevant actions, they showed fidelity to the method used to perform a relevant action both within dyads and across groups. This was true of 3-year-olds, and also 2-year-olds, therefore extending findings from previous research.

Vocal determinants of first impressions of young children

1994 ◽  
Vol 18 (3) ◽  
pp. 187-197 ◽  
Author(s):  
Diane S. Berry ◽  
Jane S. Hansen ◽  
Julie C. Landry-Pester ◽  
Jo A. Meier
Keyword(s):  
Young Children ◽  
First Impressions

scholarly journals Parents reinforce the formation of first impressions in conversation with their children

PLoS ONE ◽  
2021 ◽  
Vol 16 (8) ◽  
pp. e0256118
Author(s):  
Adam Eggleston ◽  
Cade McCall ◽  
Richard Cook ◽  
Harriet Over
Keyword(s):  
First Impressions ◽  
Facial Appearance ◽  
Child Interaction ◽  
Parent Child Interaction ◽  
Parent Child

The tendency to form first impressions from facial appearance emerges early in development. One route through which these impressions may be learned is parent-child interaction. In Study 1, 24 parent-child dyads (children aged 5–6 years, 50% male, 83% White British) were given four computer generated faces and asked to talk about each of the characters shown. Study 2 (children aged 5–6 years, 50% male, 92% White British) followed a similar procedure using images of real faces. Across both studies, around 13% of conversation related to the perceived traits of the individuals depicted. Furthermore, parents actively reinforced their children’s face-trait mappings, agreeing with the opinions they voiced on approximately 40% of occasions across both studies. Interestingly, although parents often encouraged face-trait mappings in their children, their responses to questionnaire items suggested they typically did not approve of judging others based on their appearance.

scholarly journals Facial First Impressions Across Culture: Data-Driven Modeling of Chinese and British Perceivers’ Unconstrained Facial Impressions

2017 ◽  
Vol 44 (4) ◽  
pp. 521-537 ◽  
Author(s):  
Clare A. M. Sutherland ◽  
Xizi Liu ◽  
Lingshan Zhang ◽  
Yingtung Chu ◽  
Julian A. Oldmeadow ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Sexual Selection ◽  
Cross Cultural ◽  
Economic Consequences ◽  
Three Dimensions ◽  
First Impressions ◽  
Data Driven ◽  
Facial Appearance ◽  
Threat Detection ◽  
Third Dimension ◽  
Data Driven Modeling

People form first impressions from facial appearance rapidly, and these impressions can have considerable social and economic consequences. Three dimensions can explain Western perceivers’ impressions of Caucasian faces: approachability, youthful-attractiveness, and dominance. Impressions along these dimensions are theorized to be based on adaptive cues to threat detection or sexual selection, making it likely that they are universal. We tested whether the same dimensions of facial impressions emerge across culture by building data-driven models of first impressions of Asian and Caucasian faces derived from Chinese and British perceivers’ unconstrained judgments. We then cross-validated the dimensions with computer-generated average images. We found strong evidence for common approachability and youthful-attractiveness dimensions across perceiver and face race, with some evidence of a third dimension akin to capability. The models explained ~75% of the variance in facial impressions. In general, the findings demonstrate substantial cross-cultural agreement in facial impressions, especially on the most salient dimensions.

scholarly journals Why is the literature on first impressions so focused on White faces?

2021 ◽  
Vol 8 (9) ◽  
pp. 211146
Author(s):  
Richard Cook ◽  
Harriet Over
Keyword(s):  
Present Article ◽  
Factor Structure ◽  
Strong Influence ◽  
Developmental Trajectory ◽  
First Impressions ◽  
Character Traits ◽  
Facial Appearance ◽  
Ethnic Variability ◽  
Prejudice And Discrimination

We spontaneously attribute to strangers a wide variety of character traits based on their facial appearance. While these first impressions have little or no basis in reality, they exert a strong influence over our behaviour. Cognitive scientists have revealed a great deal about first impressions from faces including their factor structure, the cues on which they are based, the neurocognitive mechanisms responsible, and their developmental trajectory. In this field, authors frequently strive to remove as much ethnic variability from stimulus sets as possible. Typically, this convention means that participants are asked to judge the likely traits of White faces only. In the present article, we consider four possible reasons for the lack of facial diversity in this literature and find that it is unjustified. Next, we illustrate how the focus on White faces has undermined scientific efforts to understand first impressions from faces and argue that it reinforces socially regressive ideas about ‘race’ and status. We go on to articulate our concern that opportunities may be lost to leverage the knowledge derived from the study of first impressions against the dire consequences of prejudice and discrimination. Finally, we highlight some promising developments in the field.

scholarly journals Spontaneous first impressions emerge from brief training

2021 ◽  
Vol 11 (1) ◽  
Author(s):  
Ruth Lee ◽  
Jonathan C. Flavell ◽  
Steven P. Tipper ◽  
Richard Cook ◽  
Harriet Over
Keyword(s):  
De Novo ◽  
First Impressions ◽  
Character Traits ◽  
Dimensional Structure ◽  
Facial Appearance ◽  
Two Dimensional ◽  
Brief Training

AbstractPeople have a strong and reliable tendency to infer the character traits of strangers based solely on facial appearance. In five highly powered and pre-registered experiments, we investigate the relative merits of learning and nativist accounts of the origins of these first impressions. First, we test whether brief periods of training can establish consistent first impressions de novo. Using a novel paradigm with Greebles—a class of synthetic object with inter-exemplar variation that approximates that seen between individual faces—we show that participants quickly learn to associate appearance cues with trustworthiness (Experiments 1 and 2). In a further experiment, we show that participants easily learn a two-dimensional structure in which individuals are presented as simultaneously varying in both trustworthiness and competence (Experiment 3). Crucially, in the final two experiments (Experiments 4 and 5) we show that, once learned, these first impressions occur following very brief exposure (100 ms). These results demonstrate that first impressions can be rapidly learned and, once learned, take on features previously thought to hold only for innate first impressions (rapid availability). Taken together, these results highlight the plausibility of learning accounts of first impressions.

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