Abstract
A choice experiment is reported in which all pairs and triples of faces from a set of eight moderately attractive faces were presented, both upright and upside down, to 103 subjects. In each orientation, the subjects had to select the face that appeared more (pairs) or most (triples) attractive to them. For each orientation, the preference probabilities that arose from the pair and triple comparisons could be described by the BTL rule (Luce, 1959). Thus, each face was represented by two scores, one reflecting its attractiveness in the upright orientation and the other reflecting its attractiveness in the inverted orientation. Orientation affected the preference probabilities. Qualitatively, score ratios between faces decreased from upright to inverted orientation, suggesting that the faces became less discriminable by inversion. Quantitatively, the effect of inversion could be described by a simple rule that assumes a face’s two attractiveness scores to be affinely related across orientations. This result indicates that inversion affected all faces about equally. The present findings are discussed with respect to faces’ first- and second-order relational properties, a distinction emphasized in current theories of face perception. They suggest that the processing of first- and secondorder relational properties is impaired by inversion to roughly the same degree.
Article PDF
Similar content being viewed by others
References
Alley, T. R., &Cunningham, M. R. (1991). Averaged faces are attractive, but very attractive faces are not average.Psychological Science,2, 123–125.
Bäuml, K.-H. (1992). Diskriminationslernen bei rotierten Gesichtern: Eine Markov-Analyse von Kodierungs- und Assoziationsprozessen.Zeitschrift für Experimentelle und Angewandte Psychologie,39, 1–17.
Bradley, R. A., &Terry, M. E. (1952). Rank analysis of incomplete block designs. I. The method of pair comparisons.Biometrika,39, 324–345.
Cunningham, M. R. (1986). Measuring the physical in physical attractiveness: Quasi-experiments on the socio-biology of female facial beauty.Journal of Personality & Social Psychology,50, 925–935.
Cunningham, M. R., Barbee, A. P., &Pike, C. L. (1990). What do women want? Facialmetric assessment of multiple motives in the perception of male facial physical attractiveness.Journal of Personality & Social Psychology,59, 61–72.
Diamond, R., &Carey, S. (1986). Why faces are and are not special: An effect of expertise.Journal of Experimental Psychology: General,115, 107–117.
Gegenfurtner, K. (1992). PRAXIS: Brent’s algorithm for function minimization.Behavior Research Methods, Instruments, & Computers,24, 560–564.
Goldstein, A. G., &Chance, J. E. (1980). Memory for faces and schema theory.Journal of Psychology,105, 47–59.
Langlois, J. H., &Roggman, L. A. (1990). Attractive faces are only average.Psychological Science,1, 115–121.
Lindgren, B. W. (1976).Statistical theory (3rd ed.). New York: Macmillan.
Luce, R. D. (1959).Individual choice behavior: A theoretical analysis. New York: Wiley.
Luce, R. D. (1977). The choice axiom after twenty years.Journal of Mathematical Psychology,15, 215–233.
Maruyama, K., &Endo, M. (1984). Illusory face dislocation effect and configural integration in the inverted face.Tohoku Psychologica Folia,43, 150–160.
Meerdink, J. E., Garbin, C. P., &Leger, D. W. (1990). Cross-gender perceptions of facial attributes and their relation to attractiveness: Do we see them differently than they see us?Perception & Psychophysics,48, 227–233.
Perrett, D. I., May, K. A., &Yoshikawa, S. (1994). Facial shape and judgements of female attractiveness.Nature,368, 239–242.
Rhodes, G., Brake, S., &Atkinson, A. P. (1993). What’s lost in inverted faces?Cognition,47, 25–57.
Rock, I. (1973).Orientation and form. New York: Academic Press.
Sergent, J. (1984). An investigation into component and configural processes underlying face perception.British Journal of Psychology,75, 221–242.
Shepard, R. N., &Metzler, J. (1971). Mental rotation of threedimensional objects.Science,171, 701–703.
Suppes, P., Krantz, D. H., Luce, R. D., &Tversky, A. (1989).Foundations of measurement (Vol. 2, pp. 383–458). San Diego: Academic Press.
Tanaka, J. W., &Farah, M. J. (1991). Second-order relational properties and the inversion effect: Testing a theory of face perception.Perception & Psychophysics,50, 367–372.
Thompson, P. (1980). Margaret Thatcher: A new illusion.Perception,9, 483–484.
Tversky, A. (1972). Elimination by aspects: A theory of choice.Psychological Review,79, 281–299.
Valentine, T. (1988). Upside-down faces: A review of the effect of inversion upon face recognition.British Journal of Psychology,79, 471–491.
Valentine, T., &Bruce, V. (1988). Mental rotation of faces.Memory & Cognition,16, 556–566.
Yin, R. K. (1969). Looking at upside-down faces.Journal of Experimental Psychology,81, 141–145.
Yin, R. K. (1970). Face recognition by brain-injured patients: A dissociable ability?Neuropsychologia,8, 395–402.
Young, A. W., Hellawell, D., &Hay, D. C. (1987). Configurational information in face perception.Perception,16, 747–759.
Author information
Authors and Affiliations
Corresponding author
Rights and permissions
About this article
Cite this article
Bäuml, KH. Upright versus upside-down faces: How interface attractiveness varies with orientation. Perception & Psychophysics 56, 163–172 (1994). https://doi.org/10.3758/BF03213895
Received:
Accepted:
Issue Date:
DOI: https://doi.org/10.3758/BF03213895