title: Familiarity effects on categorization levels of faces and objects.
abstract: It is well established that faces, in contrast to objects, are categorized as fast or faster at the individual level (e.g., Bill Clinton) than at the basic-level (e.g., human face). This subordinate-shift from basic-level categorization has been considered an outcome of visual expertise with processing faces. However, in the present study we found that, similar to familiar faces, categorization of individually-known familiar towers is also faster at the individual level than at the basic-level in naïve participants. In addition, category-verification of familiar stimuli, at basic and superordinate levels, was slower and less accurate compared to unfamiliar stimuli. Thus, the existence of detailed semantic information, regardless of expertise, can induce a shift in the default level of object categorization from basic to individual level. Moreover, the individually-specific knowledge is not only more easily-retrieved from memory but it might also interfere with accessing more general category information.
authors.affiliation: Department of Psychology, Hebrew University of Jerusalem, Jerusalem 91905, Israel. danaki@mscc.huji.ac.il
authors.forename: David
authors.initials: D
authors.lastname: Anaki
authors.forename: Shlomo
authors.initials: S
authors.lastname: Bentin
mesh_terms: D000328:Adult; D005145:Face; D005260:Female; D005556:Form Perception / Q000502:physiology*; D006801:Humans; D008297:Male; D010775:Photic Stimulation; D011597:Psychomotor Performance / Q000502:physiology; D021641:Recognition, Psychology / Q000502:physiology*; D014796:Visual Perception / Q000502:physiology; D055815:Young Adult