Chang Chien-Kai, Ho Mary Wen-Reng, Chien Sarina Hui-Lin
Graduate Institute of Neural and Cognitive Sciences, China Medical University, Taichung, Taiwan.
Graduate Institute of Biomedical Sciences, China Medical University, Taichung, Taiwan.
Front Psychol. 2018 Mar 21;9:271. doi: 10.3389/fpsyg.2018.00271. eCollection 2018.
People go beyond the inferences afforded by a person's observable features to make guesses about personality traits or even social memberships such as political affiliations. The present study extended Hu et al. (2016) to further investigate the influence of provincial appearance on differentiating KMT (Kuomintang) and DPP (Democratic Progressive Party) candidates by headshot photos with three experiments. In Experiment 1 (Membership categorization task), participants categorized the photos from the pilot study (where the difference between the perceived age of KMT and DPP candidates was reduced) and divided into four blocks by their perceived age. We found that participants were able to distinguish KMT from DPP candidates significantly better than chance, even when the perceived age difference between the two parties was minimized. In Experiment 2 (Trait rating task), we asked young and middle-aged adults to rate six traits on candidate's photos. We found that "provincial appearance" is the core trait differentiating the two parties for both young and older participants, while "facial maturity" is another trait for older participants only. In Experiment 3 (Double categorization task), we asked participants to categorize the photos from the Exp. 1 on their membership (KMT or DPP) and on provincial appearance (mainlander or native Taiwanese) in two separate sessions. Results showed that young adults were likely to use the "provincial appearance" as the main characteristic cue to categorize candidates' political membership. In sum, our study showed that Taiwanese adults could categorize the two parties by their headshot photos when age cue was eliminated. Moreover, provincial appearance was the most critical trait for differentiating between KMT and DPP candidates, which may reflect a piece of significant history during the development of the two parties.
人们超越了一个人可观察到的特征所提供的推断，去猜测其性格特征，甚至社会归属，比如政治派别。本研究扩展了Hu等人（2016年）的研究，通过三个实验，进一步调查通过头像照片，省份外貌对区分国民党和民进党候选人的影响。在实验1（成员分类任务）中，参与者对试点研究中的照片进行分类（在该研究中，国民党和民进党候选人的感知年龄差异被缩小），并根据他们感知到的年龄分为四个组块。我们发现，即使两党之间的感知年龄差异最小化，参与者也能够显著优于随机水平地区分国民党和民进党候选人。在实验2（特质评级任务）中，我们要求年轻人和中年人对候选人照片的六个特质进行评级。我们发现，“省份外貌”是年轻和年长参与者区分两党的核心特质，而“面部成熟度”只是年长参与者区分两党的另一个特质。在实验3（双重分类任务）中，我们要求参与者在两个独立的环节中，根据成员身份（国民党或民进党）和省份外貌（大陆人或台湾本地人）对实验1中的照片进行分类。结果表明，年轻人可能会将“省份外貌”作为主要特征线索来对候选人的政治成员身份进行分类。总之，我们的研究表明，当年龄线索被消除时，台湾成年人可以通过头像照片对两党进行分类。此外，省份外貌是区分国民党和民进党候选人最关键的特质，这可能反映了两党发展过程中的一段重要历史。
