Recognizing Facial Slivers

We report here an unexpectedly robust ability of healthy human participants (n = 40) to recognize extremely distorted needle-like facial images, challenging the well-entrenched notion that veridical spatial configuration is necessary for extracting facial identity. In face identification tasks of parametrically compressed internal and external features, we found that the sum of performances on each cue falls significantly short of performance on full faces, despite the equal visual information available from both measures (with full faces essentially being a superposition of internal and external features). We hypothesize that this large deficit stems from the use of positional information about how the internal features are positioned relative to the external features. To test this, we systematically changed the relations between internal and external features and found preferential encoding of vertical but not horizontal spatial relationships in facial representations (n = 20). Finally, we employ magnetoencephalography imaging (n = 20) to demonstrate a close mapping between the behavioral psychometric curve and the amplitude of the M250 face familiarity, but not M170 face-sensitive evoked response field component, providing evidence that the M250 can be modulated by faces that are perceptually identifiable, irrespective of extreme distortions to the face's veridical configuration. We theorize that the tolerance to compressive distortions has evolved from the need to recognize faces across varying viewpoints. Our findings help clarify the important, but poorly defined, concept of facial configuration and also enable an association between behavioral performance and previously reported neural correlates of face perception

Recognizing Facial Slivers

We report here an unexpectedly robust ability of healthy human participants (n = 40) to recognize extremely distorted needle-like facial images, challenging the well-entrenched notion that veridical spatial configuration is necessary for extracting facial identity. In face identification tasks of parametrically compressed internal and external features, we found that the sum of performances on each cue falls significantly short of performance on full faces, despite the equal visual information available from both measures (with full faces essentially being a superposition of internal and external features). We hypothesize that this large deficit stems from the use of positional information about how the internal features are positioned relative to the external features. To test this, we systematically changed the relations between internal and external features and found preferential encoding of vertical but not horizontal spatial relationships in facial representations (n = 20). Finally, we employ magnetoencephalography imaging (n = 20) to demonstrate a close mapping between the behavioral psychometric curve and the amplitude of the M250 face familiarity, but not M170 face-sensitive evoked response field component, providing evidence that the M250 can be modulated by faces that are perceptually identifiable, irrespective of extreme distortions to the face's veridical configuration. We theorize that the tolerance to compressive distortions has evolved from the need to recognize faces across varying viewpoints. Our findings help clarify the important, but poorly defined, concept of facial configuration and also enable an association between behavioral performance and previously reported neural correlates of face perception

The Significance of Hair for Face Recognition

Hair is a feature of the head that frequently changes in different situations. For this reason much research in the area of face perception has employed stimuli without hair. To investigate the effect of the presence of hair we used faces with and without hair in a recognition task. Participants took part in trials in which the state of the hair either remained consistent (Same) or switched between learning and test (Switch). It was found that in the Same trials performance did not differ for stimuli presented with and without hair. This implies that there is sufficient information in the internal features of the face for optimal performance in this task. It was also found that performance in the Switch trials was substantially lower than in the Same trials. This drop in accuracy when the stimuli were switched suggests that faces are represented in a holistic manner and that manipulation of the hair causes disruption to this, with implications for the interpretation of some previous studies

On Face Segmentation, Face Swapping, and Face Perception

We show that even when face images are unconstrained and arbitrarily paired, face swapping between them is actually quite simple. To this end, we make the following contributions. (a) Instead of tailoring systems for face segmentation, as others previously proposed, we show that a standard fully convolutional network (FCN) can achieve remarkably fast and accurate segmentations, provided that it is trained on a rich enough example set. For this purpose, we describe novel data collection and generation routines which provide challenging segmented face examples. (b) We use our segmentations to enable robust face swapping under unprecedented conditions. (c) Unlike previous work, our swapping is robust enough to allow for extensive quantitative tests. To this end, we use the Labeled Faces in the Wild (LFW) benchmark and measure the effect of intra- and inter-subject face swapping on recognition. We show that our intra-subject swapped faces remain as recognizable as their sources, testifying to the effectiveness of our method. In line with well known perceptual studies, we show that better face swapping produces less recognizable inter-subject results. This is the first time this effect was quantitatively demonstrated for machine vision systems

The Influence of Each Facial Feature on How We Perceive and Interpret Human Faces

[EN] Facial information is processed by our brain in such a way that we immediately make judgments about, for example, attractiveness or masculinity or interpret personality traits or moods of other people. The appearance of each facial feature has an effect on our perception of facial traits. This research addresses the problem of measuring the size of these effects for five facial features (eyes, eyebrows, nose, mouth, and jaw). Our proposal is a mixed feature-based and image-based approach that allows judgments to be made on complete real faces in the categorization tasks, more than on synthetic, noisy, or partial faces that can influence the assessment. Each facial feature of the faces is automatically classified considering their global appearance using principal component analysis. Using this procedure, we establish a reduced set of relevant specific attributes (each one describing a complete facial feature) to characterize faces. In this way, a more direct link can be established between perceived facial traits and what people intuitively consider an eye, an eyebrow, a nose, a mouth, or a jaw. A set of 92 male faces were classified using this procedure, and the results were related to their scores in 15 perceived facial traits. We show that the relevant features greatly depend on what we are trying to judge. Globally, the eyes have the greatest effect. However, other facial features are more relevant for some judgments like the mouth for happiness and femininity or the nose for dominance.This study was carried out using the Chicago Face Database developed at the University of Chicago by Debbie S. Ma, Joshua Correll, and Bernd Wittenbrink.Diego-Mas, JA.; Fuentes-Hurtado, FJ.; Naranjo Ornedo, V.; Alcañiz Raya, ML. (2020). 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Holistic Representations of Internal and External Face Features are Used to Support Recognition

Face recognition is impaired when changes are made to external face features (e.g., hairstyle), even when all internal features (i.e., eyes, nose, mouth) remain the same. Eye movement monitoring was used to determine the extent to which altered hairstyles affect processing of face features, thereby shedding light on how internal and external features are stored in memory. Participants studied a series of faces, followed by a recognition test in which novel, repeated, and manipulated (altered hairstyle) faces were presented. Recognition was higher for repeated than manipulated faces. Although eye movement patterns distinguished repeated from novel faces, viewing of manipulated faces was similar to that of novel faces. Internal and external features may be stored together as one unit in memory; consequently, changing even a single feature alters processing of the other features and disrupts recognition

Process and Domain Specificity in Regions Engaged for Face Processing: An fMRI Study of Perceptual Differentiation

The degree to which face-specific brain regions are specialized for different kinds of perceptual processing is debated. This study parametrically varied demands on featural, first-order configural, or second-order configural processing of faces and houses in a perceptual matching task to determine the extent to which the process of perceptual differentiation was selective for faces regardless of processing type (domain-specific account), specialized for specific types of perceptual processing regardless of category (process-specific account), engaged in category-optimized processing (i.e., configural face processing or featural house processing), or reflected generalized perceptual differentiation (i.e., differentiation that crosses category and processing type boundaries). ROIs were identified in a separate localizer run or with a similarity regressor in the face-matching runs. The predominant principle accounting for fMRI signal modulation in most regions was generalized perceptual differentiation. Nearly all regions showed perceptual differentiation for both faces and houses for more than one processing type, even if the region was identified as face-preferential in the localizer run. Consistent with process specificity, some regions showed perceptual differentiation for first-order processing of faces and houses (right fusiform face area and occipito-temporal cortex and right lateral occipital complex), but not for featural or second-order processing. Somewhat consistent with domain specificity, the right inferior frontal gyrus showed perceptual differentiation only for faces in the featural matching task. The present findings demonstrate that the majority of regions involved in perceptual differentiation of faces are also involved in differentiation of other visually homogenous categories

Eye-tracking explorations of attention to faces for communicative cues in Autism Spectrum Disorders

Background Individuals with Autism Spectrum Disorder (ASD) have been reported to show socio-communicative impairments which are associated with impaired face perception and atypical gaze behaviour. Attending to faces and interpreting the important socio-communicative cues presented allows us to understand other’s cognitive states, emotions, wants and desires. This information enables successful social encounters and interactions to take place. Children with ASD not attending to these important social cues on the face may cause some of the socio-communicative impairments observed within this population. Examining how children with ASD attend to faces will enhance our understanding of their communicative impairments. Aim The present thesis therefore aimed to use eye-tracking methodology to examine attention allocation to faces for communicative cues in children with ASD. Method The first line of enquiry examined how children with ASD (n = 21; age = 13y7m) attended to faces presented within their picture communication systems compared to typically developing children matched on chronological age, verbal ability age and visuo-spatial ability age. The next investigation was conducted on the same group of children and examined how children with ASD attended to faces of different familiarity including, familiar, unfamiliar and the child’s own face. These faces were also presented with direct gaze or averted gaze to investigate how this would impact on the children’s allocation of attention. The final exploration highlighted how children with ASD (n = 20; age = 12y3m) attended to socially salient information (faces) and non-socially salient information (objects) presented within social scenes of varying complexity, compared to typically developing controls. Again groups were matched based on chronological age, verbal ability age, and visuo-spatial ability age. Results Children with ASD were shown to allocate attention to faces presented within their picture communication symbols similarly compared to their typically developing counterparts. All children were shown to fixate significantly longer on the face images compared to the object images. The children with ASD fixated for similar amounts of time to the eye and mouth regions regardless of familiarity and gaze direction compared to their controlled matches. All groups looked significantly longer at the eye areas compared to the mouth areas of the faces across all familiarity types. The children also fixated longer on the eye and mouth regions of direct gazing faces compared to the regions presented on the averted gazing faces. The children with ASD fixated on the faces and objects presented within social scenes similar to their typically developing counterparts across all complexity conditions. The children were shown to fixate significantly longer on the objects compared to the faces. Conclusions Children with ASD showed typical allocation of attention to faces. This suggests that faces are not aversive to them and they are able to attend to the relevant areas such as eye and mouth regions. This may have been influenced by the inclusion of high functioning children with ASD. However these results may also suggest that attention allocation and gaze behaviour are not the only factors which contribute to the socio-communicative impairments observed in ASD