Understanding Professional Expertise in Unfamiliar Face Matching

White, David; Towler, Alice; Kemp, Richard I.

doi:10.1093/oso/9780198837749.003.0004

Cited by 21 publications

(37 citation statements)

References 53 publications

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“…Interestingly, facial examiners’ trajectory of perceptual learning in face identification—from intuitive, holistic processing to more analytic, featural comparison (see White et al, 2015)—is precisely the opposite shift that is typically thought to characterize perceptual learning and the development of expertise more generally (see Chase & Simon, 1973; Kahneman & Klein, 2009; White et al, 2021). The effectiveness of feature-based comparison observed here therefore has broader implications for the study of perceptual expertise.…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…In Towler et al (2017) we collected feature similarity ratings from a group of experts—specialist professionals known as facial examiners —who consistently outperform novices on unfamiliar face matching tasks (see White et al, 2021). Facial examiners’ identification accuracy was 14% higher than novices’ (89% vs. 78%), and their ratings of facial feature similarity were much more diagnostic of identity (Cohen’s d = 1.44).…”

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confidence: 99%

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Diagnostic feature training improves face matching accuracy.

Towler¹,

Keshwa²,

Ton³

et al. 2021

Journal of Experimental Psychology: Learning, Memory, and Cogni

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Identifying unfamiliar faces is surprisingly error-prone, even for experienced professionals who perform this task regularly. Previous attempts to train this ability have been largely unsuccessful, leading many to conclude that face identity processing is hard-wired and not amenable to further perceptual learning. Here, we take a novel expert knowledge elicitation approach to training, based on the feature-based comparison strategy used by high-performing professional facial examiners. We show that instructing novices to focus on the facial features that are most diagnostic of identity for these experts—the ears and facial marks (e.g., scars, freckles and blemishes)—improves accuracy on unfamiliar face matching tasks by 6%. This training takes just 6 min to complete and yet accounts for approximately half of experts’ superiority on the task. Benefits of training are strongest when diagnostic features are clearly visible and absent when participants are trained to rely on nondiagnostic features. Our data-driven approach contrasts with theory-driven training that is designed to improve holistic face processing mechanisms associated with familiar face recognition. This suggests that protocols which bypass the core face recognition system—and instead reorient attention to features that are undervalued by novices—offer a more promising route to training for unfamiliar face matching.

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Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

mentioning

confidence: 99%

Diagnostic feature training improves face matching accuracy.

Towler¹,

Keshwa²,

Ton³

et al. 2021

Journal of Experimental Psychology: Learning, Memory, and Cogni

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“…Professional examiners typically outperform novices on tasks within their domain of experience: facial examiners outperform novices on facial comparison (Phillips et al, 2018;White, Phillips, et al, 2015;White et al, 2020); fingerprint examiners outperform novices on fingerprint comparison (Busey & Vanderkolk, 2005;Tangen et al, 2011;Ulery et al, 2011); firearm examiners have a higher rate of correct matches than do standard computer algorithms in firearm comparison (Mattijssen et al, 2021); and document examiners are better at avoiding Bethany Growns and James D. Dunn contributed equally to this work.…”

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confidence: 99%

Match me if you can: Evidence for a domain-general visual comparison ability

et al. 2022

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Visual comparison—comparing visual stimuli (e.g., fingerprints) side by side and determining whether they originate from the same or different source (i.e., “match”)—is a complex discrimination task involving many cognitive and perceptual processes. Despite the real-world consequences of this task, which is often conducted by forensic scientists, little is understood about the psychological processes underpinning this ability. There are substantial individual differences in visual comparison accuracy amongst both professionals and novices. The source of this variation is unknown, but may reflect a domain-general and naturally varying perceptual ability. Here, we investigate this by comparing individual differences (N = 248 across two studies) in four visual comparison domains: faces, fingerprints, firearms, and artificial prints. Accuracy on all comparison tasks was significantly correlated and accounted for a substantial portion of variance (e.g., 42% in Exp. 1) in performance across all tasks. Importantly, this relationship cannot be attributed to participants’ intrinsic motivation or skill in other visual-perceptual tasks (visual search and visual statistical learning). This paper provides novel evidence of a reliable, domain-general visual comparison ability.

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“…Because of this ability, law enforcement and security organizations employ superrecognizers (1,14,32,36,37). Consistently, findings show that facial examiners are highly accurate at facial comparisons (30,46,49,50,52); similarly, other studies found that super-recognizers are also highly accurate (1-3, 6-9, 14-16, 32, 33, 36-38, 40, 44). The first paper directly comparing these two groups reported that they are equally accurate to each other (34).…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 52%

Forensic facial examiners vs. super-recognizers: Evaluating behavior beyond accuracy

Hahn¹,

Tang²,

Yates³

et al. 2021

Preprint

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Forensic facial examiners and super-recognizers are highly accurate at comparing two faces to determine identity and outperform the general population. Typically, forensic facial examiners are highly trained, whereas super-recognizers are thought to rely on natural ability. Previous studies have compared the accuracy of facial examiners and super-recognizers but have not studied the detailed behavioral properties of their face matching performance. In this study, we further analyzed data from a previous study which tested facial examiners and super-recognizers on a challenging test of face matching, or facial comparison, ability. In that study, the two groups were equally accurate. Here, we further characterize their behavior. We found distinct behaviors between these two groups, independent of overall accuracy. For differences, we found: 1) Facial examiners took advantage of the full range of the 7-point identity judgment scale; super-recognizers had a preference for the extreme ends of the scale (highly confident decisions); 2) For facial examiners, identity judgments for same-identities and different-identities mirrored each other; those from super-recognizers did not; 3) We evaluated identity judgment agreement across participants. Facial examiners agreed with each other to a greater extent than super-recognizers. We next examined metacognitive awareness of their own ability. While there were qualitative differences in the use of the scale, both groups showed behavioral insight into their own accuracy: more confident people and those who rated the task to be easier tended to be more accurate. These findings suggest that studying facial comparisons may benefit from assessing more than accuracy. This deeper understanding allows us to better interpret judgments according to the nature of a person's facial expertise and experience.

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Understanding Professional Expertise in Unfamiliar Face Matching

Cited by 21 publications

References 53 publications

Diagnostic feature training improves face matching accuracy.

Diagnostic feature training improves face matching accuracy.

Match me if you can: Evidence for a domain-general visual comparison ability

Forensic facial examiners vs. super-recognizers: Evaluating behavior beyond accuracy

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