Impact of Quality of the Image, Orientation, and Similarity of the Stimuli on Visual Search for Faces

Evidence from a series of visual-search experiments suggests that detecting an upright face amidst face-like distractors elicits a pattern of reaction times that is consistent with serial search. In four experiments the impact of orientation, number of stimuli in the display, and similarity of stimuli on search rates was examined. All displays were homogeneous. Trials were blocked by distractor type for three experiments. In the first experiment search rates for faces amidst identical faces rotated by 180° were examined. No advantage was evidenced in searching for an upright face. The impact of the quality of the face representation was examined in the second experiment. Search rates are reported for a line-drawn and a digitized image of a face amidst identical faces rotated by 180°. Search was faster for digitized than for line-drawn faces. The findings of the first experiment for orientation were replicated. In the third and fourth experiments the impact of disrupting the facial configuration in distractors was examined and performance was contrasted for blocked and mixed trials, respectively, with the same stimulus set. Reaction times increased with the number of distractors in the display in all but the nonface condition, which produced a shallow slope suggestive of parallel search. Search amidst other distractors appeared to involve the conjoining of a specific set of features with specific spatial relations. The hierarchy of relevant configural dimensions was inconsistent across these two experiments, suggesting that the symmetry, top-down order of features, orientation of the face, and predictability of the distractor type may have an interactive effect on search strategies.