Overcoming the other‐race effect in infancy with multisensory redundancy: 10–12‐month‐olds discriminate dynamic other‐race faces producing speech

We tested 4–6‐ and 10–12‐month‐old infants to investigate whether the often‐reported decline in infant sensitivity to other‐race faces may reflect responsiveness to static or dynamic/silent faces rather than a general process of perceptual narrowing. Across three experiments, we tested discrimination of either dynamic own‐race or other‐race faces which were either accompanied by a speech syllable, no sound, or a non‐speech sound. Results indicated that 4–6‐ and 10–12‐month‐old infants discriminated own‐race as well as other‐race faces accompanied by a speech syllable, that only the 10–12‐month‐olds discriminated silent own‐race faces, and that 4–6‐month‐old infants discriminated own‐race and other‐race faces accompanied by a non‐speech sound but that 10–12‐month‐old infants only discriminated own‐race faces accompanied by a non‐speech sound. Overall, the results suggest that the ORE reported to date reflects infant responsiveness to static or dynamic/silent faces rather than a general process of perceptual narrowing.