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Reflections and New Perspectives on Face Cognition as a Specific Socio-Cognitive Ability

The study of socio-cognitive abilities emerged from intelligence research, and their specificity remains controversial until today. In recent years, the psychometric structure of face cognition (FC)—a basic facet of socio-cognitive abilities—was extensively studied. In this review, we summarize and...

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Autores principales: Meyer, Kristina, Sommer, Werner, Hildebrandt, Andrea
Formato: Online Artículo Texto
Lenguaje:English
Publicado: MDPI 2021
Materias:
Acceso en línea:https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC8293405/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/34207993
http://dx.doi.org/10.3390/jintelligence9020030
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author Meyer, Kristina
Sommer, Werner
Hildebrandt, Andrea
author_facet Meyer, Kristina
Sommer, Werner
Hildebrandt, Andrea
author_sort Meyer, Kristina
collection PubMed
description The study of socio-cognitive abilities emerged from intelligence research, and their specificity remains controversial until today. In recent years, the psychometric structure of face cognition (FC)—a basic facet of socio-cognitive abilities—was extensively studied. In this review, we summarize and discuss the divergent psychometric structures of FC in easy and difficult tasks. While accuracy in difficult tasks was consistently shown to be face-specific, the evidence for easy tasks was inconsistent. The structure of response speed in easy tasks was mostly—but not always—unitary across object categories, including faces. Here, we compare studies to identify characteristics leading to face specificity in easy tasks. The following pattern emerges: in easy tasks, face specificity is found when modeling speed in a single task; however, when modeling speed across multiple, different easy tasks, only a unitary factor structure is reported. In difficult tasks, however, face specificity occurs in both single task approaches and task batteries. This suggests different cognitive mechanisms behind face specificity in easy and difficult tasks. In easy tasks, face specificity relies on isolated cognitive sub-processes such as face identity recognition. In difficult tasks, face-specific and task-independent cognitive processes are employed. We propose a descriptive model and argue for FC to be integrated into common taxonomies of intelligence.
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spelling pubmed-82934052021-07-22 Reflections and New Perspectives on Face Cognition as a Specific Socio-Cognitive Ability Meyer, Kristina Sommer, Werner Hildebrandt, Andrea J Intell Review The study of socio-cognitive abilities emerged from intelligence research, and their specificity remains controversial until today. In recent years, the psychometric structure of face cognition (FC)—a basic facet of socio-cognitive abilities—was extensively studied. In this review, we summarize and discuss the divergent psychometric structures of FC in easy and difficult tasks. While accuracy in difficult tasks was consistently shown to be face-specific, the evidence for easy tasks was inconsistent. The structure of response speed in easy tasks was mostly—but not always—unitary across object categories, including faces. Here, we compare studies to identify characteristics leading to face specificity in easy tasks. The following pattern emerges: in easy tasks, face specificity is found when modeling speed in a single task; however, when modeling speed across multiple, different easy tasks, only a unitary factor structure is reported. In difficult tasks, however, face specificity occurs in both single task approaches and task batteries. This suggests different cognitive mechanisms behind face specificity in easy and difficult tasks. In easy tasks, face specificity relies on isolated cognitive sub-processes such as face identity recognition. In difficult tasks, face-specific and task-independent cognitive processes are employed. We propose a descriptive model and argue for FC to be integrated into common taxonomies of intelligence. MDPI 2021-06-11 /pmc/articles/PMC8293405/ /pubmed/34207993 http://dx.doi.org/10.3390/jintelligence9020030 Text en © 2021 by the authors. https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/Licensee MDPI, Basel, Switzerland. This article is an open access article distributed under the terms and conditions of the Creative Commons Attribution (CC BY) license (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/).
spellingShingle Review
Meyer, Kristina
Sommer, Werner
Hildebrandt, Andrea
Reflections and New Perspectives on Face Cognition as a Specific Socio-Cognitive Ability
title Reflections and New Perspectives on Face Cognition as a Specific Socio-Cognitive Ability
title_full Reflections and New Perspectives on Face Cognition as a Specific Socio-Cognitive Ability
title_fullStr Reflections and New Perspectives on Face Cognition as a Specific Socio-Cognitive Ability
title_full_unstemmed Reflections and New Perspectives on Face Cognition as a Specific Socio-Cognitive Ability
title_short Reflections and New Perspectives on Face Cognition as a Specific Socio-Cognitive Ability
title_sort reflections and new perspectives on face cognition as a specific socio-cognitive ability
topic Review
url https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC8293405/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/34207993
http://dx.doi.org/10.3390/jintelligence9020030
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