Pulling from past research on cross-race identifications, the purpose of this study is to investigate the effects of both mixed race participants and perpetrators on eyewitness accuracy and confidence levels. In the study, participants will be shown a randomly assigned photograph of an individual from one of three racial categories: Asian, Mixed (some part Asian), and non-Asian. They will then be asked to read a fictional convenience store robbery vignette and identify the perpetrator from a 9 person simultaneous photo lineup, rate their confidence, and answer a series of questions regarding the diversity of their neighborhood, past or present school or workplace, and friend group. There are no predicted main effects. However, there are three expected interactions: the first between participant race and perpetrator race, such that the perpetrator race will not influence the accuracy for Asian and non-Asian participants. The second proposed interaction is between exposure and race, such that high exposure will cause race to be irrelevant with regard to identification accuracy. The third expected interaction is between participant race and perpetrator race, such that perpetrator race will not influence the confidence levels for mixed race participants, but will influence the accuracy for Asian and non-Asian participants.

The theory of perceptual narrowing posits that the ability to make perceptual discriminations is very broad early in development and subsequently becomes more specific with perceptual experience (Scott, Pascalis, & Nelson, 2007). This leads to the formation of biases (Pascalis et al., 2002; 2005; Kelly et al., 2007), including the other-race effect (ORE). Behavioral and electrophysiological measures are used to show that by 9-months-of-age, infants exhibit a decline in ability to distinguish between two faces from another race compared to two faces from within their own race. Significant differences in the P400 component revealed a dampening of response to other-race compared to same-race faces for 9-month-olds only. More negative N290 amplitudes in response to happy compared to sad faces were found for 5-month-olds only. Nine-month-olds did not show different responses based on emotion, indicating that race was interfering with the processing of emotion.

[pt] A presente tese de doutorado aborda a temática: Efeito da Outra Raça (EOR) na percepção de faces em crianças de origem japonesas e não japonesas. O EOR diz respeito ao melhor desempenho ao reconhecer faces da mesma raça. O trabalho é composto por dois estudos: um teórico e outro empírico. O estudo teórico teve como objetivo revisar a literatura dos últimos anos em busca de um panorama sobre modelos teóricos que buscam explicar o EOR na percepção de faces. Os resultados desse estudo apresentaram dois modelos de codificação de faces que explicam as diferenças no desempenho ao reconhecer faces de outros grupos raciais. A influência do contato com faces de raças diferentes na magnitude do efeito foi apresentada. A perspectiva da Psicologia Evolucionista foi usada como base para os modelos cognitivos estudados. O estudo empírico visou investigar o desenvolvimento do EOR em, 37 crianças de origem Japonesas e 37 crianças de origem não japonesas, que vivem na cidade do Rio de Janeiro, dividias em duas faixas etárias. As crianças Japonesas não demonstraram o EOR em relação a faces de sua raça, ao passo que crianças não japonesas o apresentaram em ambas as faixas etária. Esses achados sugerem que o EOR emerge cedo no desenvolvimento e que a experiência com faces de outra raça no contexto visual da criança é crucial para modular o sistema de processamento de faces, resultando em diferenças na precisão ao reconhecer faces do outra raça, mesmo quando a cultura desempenha um importante papel no desenvolvimento. / [en] This doctoral thesis addresses the theme: The Other Race Effect (ORE) in face perception in children of Japanese and non-Japanese origin. The ORE is related to better performance in recognizing faces of the same race. The work consists of two studies: one theoretical and one empirical. The theoretical study aimed to review the recent literature in search of an overview of theoretical models that explains the ORE in face perception. The results of this study presented two coding faces models that explain the differences in performance in recognizing faces of other racial groups. The influence of contact with faces of different races in the magnitude of the ORE was presented. The perspective of Evolutionary Psychology was used as the basis for the cognitive models studied. The empirical study aimed to investigate the development of EOR in 37 Japanese and 37 non-Japanese children, living in the city of Rio de Janeiro, divided into two age groups. Japanese children showed no EOR in recognizinhg their own race faces, while the non Japanese children presented the ORE in both age groups. These findings suggest that the EOR emerges early in development and that experience with faces of another race in the visual context of the child is crucial to modulate the face processing system, resulting in differences in accuracy in recognizing faces of another race, even when the culture plays an important role in the development.

Existing evidence shows people are able to attribute an individual's behavioural characteristics based on their facial features with a certain level of accuracy; one such characteristic is the perception of physical strength in potential opponents within the male intersexual competition. Physical strength seems be assessed upon the level of masculine facial features development. However, attributions may be influenced by other factors - namely personality traits of the evaluator or the so-called Other-race effect. In this study portrait photographs of men from Europe and Africa were rated by a group of European evaluators on a perceived physical strength. The aim of this study was to assess the link between attributed physical strength, actual physical strength (grip strength) and facial morphology described by relative facial width (fWHR) the Index of Masculinity (potential effects of age, body weight and height on said variables were controlled for). The use of stimuli of different ethnic origin enabled us to test the accuracy of physical strength attributions and actual physical strength in context to the Other-race effect hypothesis. According to its wording people tend to attribute characteristics with higher accuracy to individuals, who belong to the same population, or with whom they are...