Applied Psychology Division, School of Humanities and Social Science, The Chinese University of Hong Kong (Shenzhen), Shenzhen, China.
Psychology Department, University of New Mexico, Albuquerque, NM, USA.
Evol Psychol. 2024 Jan-Mar;22(1):14747049241238623. doi: 10.1177/14747049241238623.
This research explores how biracial facial cues affect racial perception and social judgment. We tested a coalition-signaling hypothesis of biracial cues in two studies conducted in the United States ( = 227) and China ( = 116). From the perspective of intergroup and interpersonal relations theories in social psychology, biracial features would likely be perceived as cues of threat or resource competition. In contrast, we propose an evolutionary hypothesis that biracial facial cues reveal the ancestral history of intergroup alliances between members of two races or ethnic groups. When racial cues are mixed, we predict that biracial individuals may be viewed more positively than other-race or even own-race members who often compete for limited ingroup resources. The participants observed facial images that ranged from 100% Asian to 100% Caucasian, including morphed biracial composites of 30%, 40%, 50%, 60%, and 70% Caucasian or Asian. The participants evaluated each image regarding perceived Caucasianness (Asianness), attractiveness, trustworthiness, health, intelligence, and career prospects. The US and Chinese samples yielded a similar pattern of own-race bias in racial perception and biracial favoritism in social judgment. The social judgment ratings were not correlated with the racial perception scores and were independent of the sex of the participants or biracial images, indicating a coalitional motive, instead of a mating motive, underlying social perception of biracial individuals. Overall, the results suggest that biracial facial features signal a successful genetic admixture and coalition in parental generations and thus increase the trustworthiness and cooperative potential of a biracial person.
本研究探讨了双种族面部特征如何影响种族认知和社会判断。我们在美国（ = 227）和中国（ = 116）进行的两项研究中测试了一个关于双种族线索的联合信号假说。从社会心理学中群体间和人际关系理论的角度来看，双种族特征可能被视为威胁或资源竞争的线索。相比之下，我们提出了一个进化假说，即双种族面部特征揭示了两个种族或族群成员之间的群体间联盟的祖先历史。当种族线索混合时，我们预测双种族个体可能比其他种族甚至自己种族的成员更受正面看待，因为后者常常为有限的内群体资源而竞争。参与者观察了从 100%亚洲到 100%高加索的面部图像，包括 30%、40%、50%、60%和 70%高加索或亚洲的混合双种族合成图像。参与者根据感知的高加索人（亚洲人）、吸引力、可信度、健康、智力和职业前景来评价每个图像。美国和中国的样本都表现出种族认知中的本族偏见和社会判断中的双种族偏好的相似模式。社会判断评分与种族认知评分不相关，且与参与者或双种族图像的性别无关，这表明社会对双种族个体的感知背后是一种联合动机，而不是交配动机。总的来说，结果表明，双种族面部特征标志着父母一代中成功的基因混合和联盟，从而增加了双种族个体的可信度和合作潜力。
