Department of Psychiatry, Charité Campus Mitte, Berlin, Germany.
PLoS One. 2011;6(12):e29361. doi: 10.1371/journal.pone.0029361. Epub 2011 Dec 21.
From the first days of life, humans preferentially orient towards upright faces, likely reflecting innate subcortical mechanisms. Here, we show that binocular rivalry can reveal face detection mechanisms in adults that are surprisingly similar to inborn face detection mechanism. We used continuous flash suppression (CFS), a variant of binocular rivalry, to render stimuli invisible at the beginning of each trial and measured the time upright and inverted stimuli needed to overcome such interocular suppression. Critically, specific stimulus properties previously shown to modulate looking preferences in neonates similarly modulated adults' awareness of faces presented during CFS. First, the advantage of upright faces in overcoming CFS was strongly modulated by contrast polarity and direction of illumination. Second, schematic patterns consisting of three dark blobs were suppressed for shorter durations when the arrangement of these blobs respected the face-like configuration of the eyes and the mouth, and this effect was modulated by contrast polarity. No such effects were obtained in a binocular control experiment not involving CFS, suggesting a crucial role for face-sensitive mechanisms operating outside of conscious awareness. These findings indicate that visual awareness of faces in adults is governed by perceptual mechanisms that are sensitive to similar stimulus properties as those modulating newborns' face preferences.
从生命的最初几天起，人类就优先关注直立的面孔，这可能反映了先天的皮层下机制。在这里，我们表明，双眼竞争可以揭示成年人的面孔检测机制，这些机制令人惊讶地类似于先天的面孔检测机制。我们使用连续闪光抑制（CFS），一种双眼竞争的变体，在每次试验开始时使刺激不可见，并测量直立和倒置刺激克服这种眼间抑制所需的时间。关键是，先前被证明可以调节新生儿注视偏好的特定刺激特性同样可以调节成年人在 CFS 期间对面孔的意识。首先，直立面孔在克服 CFS 方面的优势强烈受到对比极性和照明方向的调节。其次，当这些斑点的排列尊重眼睛和嘴巴的类似面孔的配置时，由三个暗点组成的示意图模式被抑制的时间更短，并且这种效果受到对比极性的调节。在不涉及 CFS 的双眼对照实验中没有获得这种效果，这表明在意识之外运作的面孔敏感机制起着至关重要的作用。这些发现表明，成年人对面孔的视觉意识受到感知机制的控制，这些机制对调节新生儿面孔偏好的类似刺激特性敏感。
