Effects of high-pass and low-pass spatial filtering on face identification

If face images are degraded by block averaging, there is a nonlinear decline in recognition accuracy as block size increases, suggesting that identification requires a critical minimum range of object spatial frequencies. The identification of faces was measured with equivalent Fourier low-pass filtering and block averaging preserving the same information and with high-pass transformations. In Experiment 1, accuracy declined and response time increased in a significant nonlinear manner in all cases as the spatial-frequency range was reduced. However, it did so at a faster rate for the quantized and high-passed images. A second experiment controlled for the differences in the contrast of the high-pass faces and found a reduced but significant and nonlinear decline in performance as the spatial-frequency range was reduced. These data suggest that face identification is preferentially supported by a band of spatial frequencies of approximately 8-16 cycles per face; contrast or line-based explanations were found to be inadequate. The data are discussed in terms of current models of face identification.

[1]  D. G. Green,et al.  Optical and retinal factors affecting visual resolution. , 1965, The Journal of physiology.

[2]  L. D. Harmon.  The recognition of faces. , 1973, Scientific American.

[3]  B Julesz,et al.  Masking in Visual Recognition: Effects of Two-Dimensional Filtered Noise , 1973, Science.

[4]  W. Thorpe.  Duet-Singing Birds , 1973 .

[5]  Leo Ganz,et al.  Recognition of faces in the presence of two-dimensional sinusoidal masks , 1977 .

[6]  D Riley,et al.  Comments on “Recognition of faces in the presence of two-dimensional sinusoidal masks” by Tieger and Ganz , 1980, Perception & psychophysics.

[7]  D M Parker,et al.  Simple reaction times to the onset, onset, and contrast reversal of sinusoidal grating stimuli , 1980, Perception & psychophysics.

[8]  R. E. Edwards,et al.  Fourier series : a modern introduction , 1982 .

[9]  David C. Burr,et al.  Added noise restores recognizability of coarse quantized images , 1983, Nature.

[10]  G. Sandini,et al.  The Role of High Spatial Frequencies in Face Perception , 1983, Perception.

[11]  Michael S. Landy,et al.  HIPS: Image processing under UNIX. Software and applications , 1984 .

[12]  J. W. Shepherd,et al.  An Interactive Computer System for Retrieving Faces , 1986 .

[13]  M C Morrone,et al.  Recognition of Positive and Negative Bandpass-Filtered Images , 1986, Perception.

[14]  J. Sergent.  Microgenesis of Face Perception , 1986 .

[15]  M. Moscovitch,et al.  Backward masking of lateralized faces by noise, pattern, and spatial frequency , 1987, Brain and Cognition.

[16]  I. Biederman.  Recognition-by-components: a theory of human image understanding. , 1987, Psychological review.

[17]  Further analyses of masking functions in laterality studies of face-recognition , 1988, Brain and Cognition.

[18]  Some masked inconstancies about constancy , 1988, Brain and Cognition.

[19]  S. Ullman.  Aligning pictorial descriptions: An approach to object recognition , 1989, Cognition.

[20]  J. Pepe,et al.  Hemispheric asymmetry in the processing of high and low spatial frequencies: A facial recognition task , 1989, Brain and Cognition.

[21]  B. Moulden,et al.  The Standard Deviation of Luminance as a Metric for Contrast in Random-Dot Images , 1990, Perception.

[22]  T. Bachmann.  Identification of spatially quantised tachistoscopic images of faces: How many pixels does it take to carry identity? , 1991 .

[23]  I. Biederman,et al.  Dynamic binding in a neural network for shape recognition. , 1992, Psychological review.

[24]  J. R. Vokey,et al.  Familiarity, memorability, and the effect of typicality on the recognition of faces , 1992, Memory & cognition.

[25]  Alice J. O'Toole,et al.  Low-dimensional representation of faces in higher dimensions of the face space , 1993 .

[26]  Vicki Bruce,et al.  Describing the shapes of faces using surface primitives , 1993, Image Vis. Comput..

[27]  A. O'Toole,et al.  Structural aspects of face recognition and the other-race effect , 1994, Memory & cognition.

[28]  V. Bruce,et al.  What's Distinctive about a Distinctive Face? , 1994, The Quarterly journal of experimental psychology. A, Human experimental psychology.

[29]  I. Craw,et al.  Spatial Content and Spatial Quantisation Effects in Face Recognition , 1994, Perception.

[30]  Albert A. Michelson,et al.  Studies in Optics , 1995 .