The relations between the development of object and face expertise

本研究的重点是阐明客体和面孔加工过程中知觉和注意的基本机制。关于儿童如何发展面部处理的专门知识，有一个长期的争论-是一个专门的机制参与或面部处理很像其他感兴趣的对象？为了回答这个问题，我们将看看随着孩子们在7岁到13岁之间对物体和面孔的经验进行微调，面孔和物体处理的知觉专业知识是如何随着时间的推移而发展的。虽然对面孔的兴趣在大多数儿童中是普遍存在的，但儿童对物体的兴趣存在相当大的差异。有些孩子对特定的物体没有特别的兴趣，有些孩子追求与物体有关的爱好，还有一些孩子（例如，据估计，75%的自闭症谱系障碍儿童对干扰其家庭和社会生活的物体有限制的兴趣。我们将利用这种可变性来确定儿童对特定物体的体验（例如，火车）有助于发展对这些物体的感知专门知识。我们将研究选择性注意力的组成部分（即，定向和分离注意力，寻找目标，过滤干扰物，以及在对象和面部处理的背景下启动（先前经验/期望的影响）。我们还将研究在自由观看条件下的注意力，并跟踪专家物体和面部的眼动模式。研究结果将告诉我们的数量和质量的儿童的经验与对象，以及如何这些有助于发展的感性专业知识时，感兴趣的对象是自我选择和追求密集和广泛的一段时间。我们将能够报告知觉专业知识如何影响面孔处理，以及选择性注意是否以及以何种方式在物体和面孔处理的发展中发挥作用。这些发现将使研究人员更好地理解知觉发展的概念和方法，包括选择性注意的作用。

The focus of my research is to elucidate basic mechanisms of perception and attention involved in the development of object and face processing. There is a longstanding debate about how children develop expertise in face processing - is a specialized mechanism involved or are faces processed much like other objects of interest? To answer this question we will look at how perceptual expertise for face and object processing develops over time as children fine-tune their experience with objects and faces between the ages of 7 and 13 years. Whereas the interest in faces is ubiquitous in most children, there is considerable variability in the interest in objects among children. Some children have no particular interest in specific objects, others pursue hobbies that involve objects, and still others (e.g., an estimated 75% of children with Autism Spectrum Disorder have a circumscribed interest in objects that interferes with their family and social life. We will capitalize on this variability to determine if, and in what way, children's experience with a specific object (e.g., trains) contributes to the development of perceptual expertise for those objects. We will examine the components of selective attention (i.e., orienting and disengaging attention, searching for targets, filtering distractors, and priming - the influence of previous experience/expectations) within the context of object and face processing. We will also examine attention in free-viewing conditions and track eye-movement patterns to expert objects and faces. The findings will inform us about the quantity and quality of children's experience with objects and how these contribute to the development of perceptual expertise when the object of interest is self-selected and pursued intensively and over an extensive period of time. We will be able to report on how perceptual expertise may affect face processing and if and in what way selective attention plays a role in the development of object and face processing. The findings will equip researchers with better conceptual as well as methodological understanding of perceptual development that includes the role of selective attention.