Fodarella Cristina, Brown Charity, Lewis Amy, Frowd Charlie D
Department of Psychology, University of Winchester , Winchester, UK.
School of Psychology, University of Leeds , Leeds, UK.
Front Psychol. 2015 Aug 21;6:1237. doi: 10.3389/fpsyg.2015.01237. eCollection 2015.
The own-age bias (OAB) refers to recognition memory being more accurate for people of our own age than other age groups (e.g., Wright and Stroud, 2002). This paper investigated whether the OAB effect is present during construction of human faces (also known as facial composites, often for forensic/police use). In doing so, it adds to our understanding of factors influencing both facial memory across the life span as well as performance of facial composites. Participant-witnesses were grouped into younger (19-35 years) and older (51-80 years) adults, and constructed a single composite from memory of an own- or cross-age target face using the feature-based composite system PRO-fit. They also completed the shortened version of the glasgow face matching test (GFMT; Burton et al., 2010). A separate group of participants who were familiar with the relevant identities attempted to name the resulting composites. Correct naming of the composites revealed the presence of an OAB for older adults, who constructed more-identifiable composites of own-age than cross-age faces. For younger adults, age of target face did not influence correct naming and their composites were named at the same level as those constructed by older adults for younger targets. Also, there was no reliable correlation between face perception ability and composite quality. Overall, correct naming was fairly good across the experiment, and indicated benefit for older witnesses for older targets. Results are discussed in terms of contemporary theories of OAB, and implications of the work for forensic practice.
年龄内隐偏见（OAB）是指我们对同龄人面孔的识别记忆比对其他年龄组的面孔识别记忆更准确（例如，Wright和Stroud，2002）。本文研究了在构建人脸（也称为面部合成像，常用于法医/警方）过程中是否存在年龄内隐偏见效应。这样做有助于我们理解影响毕生面部记忆以及面部合成像表现的因素。参与见证者被分为年轻成年人（19 - 35岁）和年长成年人（51 - 80岁），他们使用基于特征的合成系统PRO-fit，根据对同年龄或跨年龄目标面孔的记忆构建单个合成像。他们还完成了格拉斯哥面部匹配测试（GFMT；Burton等人，2010）的简化版。另一组熟悉相关身份的参与者试图说出最终的合成像。对合成像的正确识别表明年长成年人存在年龄内隐偏见，他们构建的同年龄面孔的合成像比跨年龄面孔的合成像更易识别。对于年轻成年人，目标面孔的年龄不影响正确识别，他们构建的合成像被识别的水平与年长成年人构建的年轻目标面孔的合成像相同。此外，面部感知能力与合成像质量之间没有可靠的相关性。总体而言，在整个实验中正确识别情况相当不错，表明年长证人在识别年长目标方面具有优势。本文根据当代年龄内隐偏见理论对结果进行了讨论，并阐述了该研究对法医实践的意义。
