title: Congruency as a nonspecific perceptual property contributing to newborns' face preference.
abstract: Past research has shown that top-heaviness is a perceptual property that plays a crucial role in triggering newborns' preference toward faces. The present study examined the contribution of a second configural property, congruency, to newborns' face preference. Experiments 1 and 2 demonstrated that when embedded in nonfacelike stimuli, congruency induces a preference of the same strength as that induced by facedness. Experiments 3 and 4 demonstrated that the attentional biases toward facedness and congruency produce a cumulative effect on newborns' visual preferences according to an additive model. These findings were extended by those of Experiment 5, showing that the additive model holds true when congruency is added to top-heaviness in nonfacelike stimuli displaying more elements in the upper portion.
authors: Department of Psychology, University of Milano-Bicocca, Milano, Italy. viola.macchicassia@unimib.it
authors: Viola Macchi
authors: VM
authors: Cassia
authors: Eloisa
authors: E
authors: Valenza
authors: Francesca
authors: F
authors: Simion
authors: Irene
authors: I
authors: Leo
mesh_terms: D001288:Attention; D005149:Facial Expression; D005260:Female; D006801:Humans; D007231:Infant, Newborn; D008297:Male; D021641:Recognition, Psychology; D014796:Visual Perception