title: The bilateral advantage for famous faces: interhemispheric communication or competition?
abstract: The bilateral advantage for the perception of famous faces was investigated using a redundant target procedure. In experiment 1 we compared simultaneous presentation of stimuli (a) bilaterally and (b) one above the other in the central field. Results showed a redundancy advantage, but only when faces were presented bilaterally. This result lends support to the notion of interhemispheric communication using cross-hemisphere representations. Experiment 2 examined the nature of such communication by comparing bilateral presentation of identical face images, with bilateral presentation of different images of the same person. When asked to make a familiar/unfamiliar face judgement, participants showed evidence for a redundancy advantage under both bilateral conditions. This suggests that the nature of the information shared in interhemispheric communication is abstract, rather than being tied to superficial stimulus properties.
authors.affiliation: Department of Psychology, University of Glasgow, Glasgow G12 8QQ, UK.
authors.forename: Lyndsay M
authors.initials: LM
authors.lastname: Baird
authors.forename: A Mike
authors.initials: AM
authors.lastname: Burton
mesh_terms: D000293:Adolescent; D000328:Adult; D004292:Dominance, Cerebral / Q000502:physiology*; D005145:Face; D005260:Female; D007839:Functional Laterality / Q000502:physiology*; D006801:Humans; D008297:Male; D008568:Memory / Q000502:physiology; D010775:Photic Stimulation; D011597:Psychomotor Performance / Q000502:physiology; D011930:Reaction Time / Q000502:physiology; D021641:Recognition, Psychology / Q000502:physiology*; D014794:Visual Fields / Q000502:physiology; D014796:Visual Perception / Q000502:physiology*