Social experience does not abolish cultural diversity in eye movements

Kelly, D. J., Jack, R. E. , Miellet, S., De Luca, E., Foreman, K. and Caldara, R. (2011) Social experience does not abolish cultural diversity in eye movements. Frontiers in Psychology, 2(Art 95), (doi: 10.3389/fpsyg.2011.00095)

Abstract

Adults from Eastern (e.g., China) and Western (e.g., USA) cultural groups display pronounced differences in a range of visual processing tasks. For example, the eye movement strategies used for information extraction during a variety of face processing tasks (e.g., identification and facial expressions of emotion categorization) differs across cultural groups. Currently, many of the differences reported in previous studies have asserted that culture itself is responsible for shaping the way we process visual information, yet this has never been directly investigated. In the current study, we assessed the relative contribution of genetic and cultural factors by testing face processing in a population of British Born Chinese adults using face recognition and expression classification tasks. Contrary to predictions made by the cultural differences framework, the majority of British Born Chinese adults deployed “Eastern” eye movement strategies, while approximately 25% of participants displayed “Western” strategies. Furthermore, the cultural eye movement strategies used by individuals were consistent across recognition and expression tasks. These findings suggest that “culture” alone cannot straightforwardly account for diversity in eye movement patterns. Instead a more complex understanding of how the environment and individual experiences can influence the mechanisms that govern visual processing is required.

• Item Type: Articles
• Status: Published
• Refereed: Yes
• Glasgow Author(s) Enlighten ID: Caldara, Professor Roberto and De Luca, Dr Emanuele and Jack, Professor Rachael and Kelly, Dr David and Wright-Whyte, Ms Kay
• Authors: Kelly, D. J., Jack, R. E., Miellet, S., De Luca, E., Foreman, K., and Caldara, R.
• College/School: College of Medical Veterinary and Life Sciences > School of Health & Wellbeing > Mental Health and Wellbeing; College of Medical Veterinary and Life Sciences > School of Psychology & Neuroscience; College of Science and Engineering > School of Psychology
• Journal Name: Frontiers in Psychology
• Publisher: Frontiers Research Foundation
• ISSN: 1664-1078
• ISSN (Online): 1664-1078
• Copyright Holders: Copyright © 2011 The Authors
• First Published: First published in Frontiers in Psychology 2(95)
• Publisher Policy: Reproduced in accordance with the copyright policy of the publisher

Project Code	Award No	Project Name	Principal Investigator	Funder's Name	Funder Ref	Lead Dept
50002	1	The impact of culture on perception and face processing during development	David Kelly	Economic & Social Research Council (ESRC)	RES-000-22-3338	PSY - PSYCHOLOGY