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Age‐Related Differences in Sensitivity to Facial Trustworthiness: Perceptual Representation and the Role of Emotional Development
Author(s) -
Baccolo Elisa,
Macchi Cassia Viola
Publication year - 2019
Publication title -
child development
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 3.103
H-Index - 257
eISSN - 1467-8624
pISSN - 0009-3920
DOI - 10.1111/cdev.13340
Subject(s) - psychology , perception , similarity (geometry) , comprehension , developmental psychology , face perception , set (abstract data type) , trait , social perception , cognitive psychology , trustworthiness , emotion perception , facial expression , representation (politics) , child development , face (sociological concept) , social cognition , cognition , social psychology , communication , artificial intelligence , law , image (mathematics) , linguistics , sociology , computer science , political science , programming language , neuroscience , politics , social science , philosophy
The ability to discriminate social signals from faces is a fundamental component of human social interactions whose developmental origins are still debated. In this study, 5‐year‐old ( N = 29) and 7‐year‐old children ( N = 31) and adults ( N = 34) made perceptual similarity and trustworthiness judgments on a set of female faces varying in level of expressed trustworthiness. All groups represented perceived similarity of the faces as a function of trustworthiness intensity, but such representation becomes more fine‐grained with development. Moreover, 5‐year‐olds' accuracy in choosing the more trustworthy face in a pair varied as a function of children's score at the Test of Emotion Comprehension, suggesting that the ability to perform face‐to‐trait inferences is related to the development of emotional understanding.