title: Model Fitting Versus Curve Fitting: A Model of Renormalization Provides a Better Account of Age Aftereffects Than a Model of Local Repulsion.
abstract: Recently, we proposed that the aftereffects of adapting to facial age are consistent with a renormalization of the perceived age (e.g., so that after adapting to a younger or older age, all ages appear slightly older or younger, respectively). This conclusion has been challenged by arguing that the aftereffects can also be accounted for by an alternative model based on repulsion (in which facial ages above or below the adapting age are biased away from the adaptor). However, we show here that this challenge was based on allowing the fitted functions to take on values which are implausible and incompatible across the different adapting conditions. When the fits are constrained or interpreted in terms of standard assumptions about normalization and repulsion, then the two analyses both agree in pointing to a pattern of renormalization in age aftereffects.
authors.affiliation: Department of Psychology, University of Nevada, Reno, Nevada, USA.
authors.forename: Sean F
authors.initials: SF
authors.lastname: O'Neil
authors.affiliation: Department of Psychology, University of Nevada, Reno, Nevada, USA.
authors.forename: Amy
authors.initials: A
authors.lastname: Mac
authors.affiliation: ARC Centre of Excellence in Cognition and its Disorders, School of Psychology, University of Western Australia, Perth, Australia.
authors.forename: Gillian
authors.initials: G
authors.lastname: Rhodes
authors.affiliation: Department of Psychology, University of Nevada, Reno, Nevada, USA.
authors.forename: Michael A
authors.initials: MA
authors.lastname: Webster
keywords: Face perception; adaptation; aftereffects; age perception; norm-based coding