title: Bandwidths for the perception of head orientation decrease during childhood.
abstract: Adults use the orientation of people's heads as a cue to the focus of their attention. We examined developmental changes in mechanisms underlying sensitivity to head orientation during childhood. Eight-, 10-, 12-year-olds, and adults were adapted to a frontal face view or a 20° left or right side view before judging the orientation of a face at or near frontal. After frontal adaptation, there were no age differences in judgments of head orientation. However, after adaptation to a 20° left or right side view, aftereffects were larger and sensitivity to head orientation was lower in 8- and 10-year-olds than in adults, with no difference between 12-year-olds and adults. A computational model indicates that these results can be modeled as a consequence of decreasing neural tuning bandwidths and decreasing additive internal noise during childhood, and/or as a consequence of increasing inhibition during childhood. These results provide the first evidence that neural mechanisms underlying sensitivity to head orientation undergo considerable refinement during childhood.
authors.affiliation: McMaster University, 1280 Main Street West, Hamilton, ON, L8S 4L8, Canada. Electronic address: vidamd@mcmaster.ca.
authors.forename: Mark D
authors.initials: MD
authors.lastname: Vida
authors.affiliation: York University, 4700 Keele Street, Toronto, ON M3J 1P3, Canada. Electronic address: hrwilson@yorku.ca.
authors.forename: Hugh R
authors.initials: HR
authors.lastname: Wilson
authors.affiliation: McMaster University, 1280 Main Street West, Hamilton, ON, L8S 4L8, Canada. Electronic address: maurer@mcmaster.ca.
authors.forename: Daphne
authors.initials: D
authors.lastname: Maurer
mesh_terms: D000293:Adolescent; D000328:Adult; D000375:Aging / Q000502:physiology*; D000704:Analysis of Variance; D002648:Child; D004192:Discrimination, Psychological; D005260:Female; D006257:Head; D006801:Humans; D008297:Male; D010775:Photic Stimulation / Q000379:methods; D011187:Posture; D021641:Recognition, Psychology / Q000502:physiology*; D055815:Young Adult
keywords: Adaptation; Aftereffects; Children; Computational modeling; Face viewpoint; Head orientation