Multiple Mechanisms in the Perception of Face Gender: Effect of Sex-Irrelevant Features

• Published in: Journal of experimental psychology. Human perception and performance Vol. 37; no. 3; pp. 626 - 633
• Main Authors: Komori, Masashi, Kawamura, Satoru, Ishihara, Shigekazu
• Format: Journal Article
• Language: English
• Published: United States American Psychological Association 01.06.2011
• Subjects: Adolescent; Adult; Aged; Algorithms; Cues; Face - anatomy & histology; Factor Analysis; Female; Femininity; Gender Discrimination; Higher Education; Humans; Male; Masculinity; Middle Aged; Models, Anatomic; Predictor Variables; Principal Component Analysis; Principal Components Analysis; Recognition (Psychology); Reference Values; School Personnel; Sex Characteristics; Sexual Identity; Social Perception; Undergraduate Students; Visual Perception; Young Adult
• ISSN: 0096-1523; 1939-1277
• DOI: 10.1037/a0020369

Effects of sex-relevant and sex-irrelevant facial features on the evaluation of facial gender were investigated. Participants rated masculinity of 48 male facial photographs and femininity of 48 female facial photographs. Eighty feature points were measured on each of the facial photographs. Using a generalized Procrustes analysis, facial shapes were converted into multidimensional vectors, with the average face as a starting point. Each vector was decomposed into a sex-relevant subvector and a sex-irrelevant subvector which were, respectively, parallel and orthogonal to the main male-female axis. Principal components analysis (PCA) was performed on the sex-irrelevant subvectors. One principal component was negatively correlated with both perceived masculinity and femininity, and another was correlated only with femininity, though both components were orthogonal to the male-female dimension (and thus by definition sex-irrelevant). These results indicate that evaluation of facial gender depends on sex-irrelevant as well as sex-relevant facial features. (Contains 5 figures and 3 tables.)