Sugita Yoichi
Core Research for Evolutional Science and Technology (CREST), Japan Science and Technology Agency, Sanban-cho 5, Chiyoda-ku, Tokyo 102-0075, Japan.
Proc Natl Acad Sci U S A. 2008 Jan 8;105(1):394-8. doi: 10.1073/pnas.0706079105. Epub 2008 Jan 2.
Infant monkeys were reared with no exposure to any faces for 6-24 months. Before being allowed to see a face, the monkeys showed a preference for human and monkey faces in photographs, and they discriminated human faces as well as monkey faces. After the deprivation period, the monkeys were exposed first to either human or monkey faces for a month. Soon after, the monkeys selectively discriminated the exposed species of face and showed a marked difficulty in regaining the ability to discriminate the other nonexposed species of face. These results indicate the existence of an experience-independent ability for face processing as well as an apparent sensitive period during which a broad but flexible face prototype develops into a concrete one for efficient processing of familiar faces.
将幼猴饲养6至24个月，使其不接触任何面孔。在允许幼猴看面孔之前，它们对照片中的人类和猴子面孔表现出偏好，并且能够区分人类面孔和猴子面孔。在剥夺期之后，幼猴先接触人类或猴子面孔一个月。不久之后，幼猴能够选择性地区分所接触的面孔物种，并且在重新获得区分其他未接触面孔物种的能力方面表现出明显困难。这些结果表明存在一种不依赖经验的面孔处理能力，以及一个明显的敏感期，在此期间，一个宽泛但灵活的面孔原型发展成为一个具体的原型，以便高效处理熟悉的面孔。
