WHAT CHANGES IN FACE PROCESSING WITH FACE INVERSION AND WITH SHORT PRESENTATION DURATIONS

Inverting faces has been assumed to disrupt holistic/configural face processing. On the other hand, holistic processing is believed to happen at a glance. This later belief concurs with the notion of a holistic-to-analytic transition at successive stages of processing. In a series of studies with synthetic emotional faces, arising from the combination of facial ‘action units’ (AUs) taken as factors, the effects of upright versus inverted versus shortened presentation durations (300 ms), was investigated. Short presentations had similar effects to face inversion, resulting in the weakening, often the nullification, of the effects of one or more AUs, together with the enhanced functioning of another, single AU. The joint functioning of all AUs thus appears to require time, rather than resting on a swift holistic operation. An interpretation of inversion effects in terms of increased difficulty is suggested in view of their found similarity to the effects of tachistoscopic presentations.