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Upright and inverted unfamiliar face-matching tasks – everything correlates everywhere all at once

Jeremy Tree Orcid Logo, Alex Jones Orcid Logo, Robin S. S. Kramer

Memory & Cognition

Swansea University Authors: Jeremy Tree Orcid Logo, Alex Jones Orcid Logo

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DOI (Published version): 10.3758/s13421-025-01725-w

Abstract

In a key study, Megreya and Burton (Memory & Cognition, 34, 865–876, 2006) argued that identity-matching tasks using unfamiliar faces may not effectively measure general ‘real-world’ face-processing ability – that is they are “not faces”. They observed a high correlation in performance between u...

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Published in: Memory & Cognition
ISSN: 0090-502X 1532-5946
Published: Springer Science and Business Media LLC 2025
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URI: https://cronfa.swan.ac.uk/Record/cronfa69274
first_indexed 2025-04-11T09:21:29Z
last_indexed 2025-10-18T09:45:11Z
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spelling 2025-10-17T09:44:08.3854885 v2 69274 2025-04-11 Upright and inverted unfamiliar face-matching tasks – everything correlates everywhere all at once 373fd575114a743d502a979c6161b1ad 0000-0001-6000-8125 Jeremy Tree Jeremy Tree true false a24e1e2a89b0a9120fe03b481a629edd 0000-0003-3600-3644 Alex Jones Alex Jones true false 2025-04-11 PSYS In a key study, Megreya and Burton (Memory & Cognition, 34, 865–876, 2006) argued that identity-matching tasks using unfamiliar faces may not effectively measure general ‘real-world’ face-processing ability – that is they are “not faces”. They observed a high correlation in performance between upright and inverted unfamiliar face matching, a pattern not seen with familiar faces, which they interpreted as indicating unfamiliar face matching is qualitatively different and largely driven by image-specific factors. However, the authors cautioned that this limitation likely applies only to unfamiliar face-matching tasks for identity rather than other types of face judgements (e.g., emotion). The present study replicates and extends these findings by considering within-subject performance for upright/inverted unfamiliar face matching across various paradigms (sequential/simultaneous presentation or sorting) and face-judgement types (identity or emotion), whilst considering different types of measures (accuracy and reaction time). Our results illustrated high correlations for upright/inverted conditions were universally observed within tasks for both accuracy and reaction times. Subsequent factor analyses indicated that upright and inverted conditions loaded together into task-specific latent variables. These results concur with the conclusions of Megreya and Burton (2006) and extend to both identity and emotion matching tasks – that is such tasks exhibit low construct validity for testing hypotheses about much general ‘everyday’ face processing. We propose that researchers should carefully consider alignment between their test materials and the theoretical ‘constructs’ they aim to measure, ensuring more accurate and meaningful interpretations of their results. Journal Article Memory & Cognition 0 Springer Science and Business Media LLC 0090-502X 1532-5946 Face processing; Face matching; Face inversion effects; Psychometrics 7 5 2025 2025-05-07 10.3758/s13421-025-01725-w COLLEGE NANME Psychology School COLLEGE CODE PSYS Swansea University SU Library paid the OA fee (TA Institutional Deal) Swansea University 2025-10-17T09:44:08.3854885 2025-04-11T10:19:26.7354835 Faculty of Medicine, Health and Life Sciences School of Psychology Jeremy Tree 0000-0001-6000-8125 1 Alex Jones 0000-0003-3600-3644 2 Robin S. S. Kramer 3 69274__34299__373ecc65521b418988b12dfc70280a61.pdf 69274.VoR.pdf 2025-05-19T12:46:42.0035947 Output 1981658 application/pdf Version of Record true © The Author(s) 2025. This article is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License. true eng http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/
title Upright and inverted unfamiliar face-matching tasks – everything correlates everywhere all at once
spellingShingle Upright and inverted unfamiliar face-matching tasks – everything correlates everywhere all at once
Jeremy Tree
Alex Jones
title_short Upright and inverted unfamiliar face-matching tasks – everything correlates everywhere all at once
title_full Upright and inverted unfamiliar face-matching tasks – everything correlates everywhere all at once
title_fullStr Upright and inverted unfamiliar face-matching tasks – everything correlates everywhere all at once
title_full_unstemmed Upright and inverted unfamiliar face-matching tasks – everything correlates everywhere all at once
title_sort Upright and inverted unfamiliar face-matching tasks – everything correlates everywhere all at once
author_id_str_mv 373fd575114a743d502a979c6161b1ad
a24e1e2a89b0a9120fe03b481a629edd
author_id_fullname_str_mv 373fd575114a743d502a979c6161b1ad_***_Jeremy Tree
a24e1e2a89b0a9120fe03b481a629edd_***_Alex Jones
author Jeremy Tree
Alex Jones
author2 Jeremy Tree
Alex Jones
Robin S. S. Kramer
format Journal article
container_title Memory & Cognition
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publishDate 2025
institution Swansea University
issn 0090-502X
1532-5946
doi_str_mv 10.3758/s13421-025-01725-w
publisher Springer Science and Business Media LLC
college_str Faculty of Medicine, Health and Life Sciences
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hierarchy_top_title Faculty of Medicine, Health and Life Sciences
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hierarchy_parent_title Faculty of Medicine, Health and Life Sciences
department_str School of Psychology{{{_:::_}}}Faculty of Medicine, Health and Life Sciences{{{_:::_}}}School of Psychology
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description In a key study, Megreya and Burton (Memory & Cognition, 34, 865–876, 2006) argued that identity-matching tasks using unfamiliar faces may not effectively measure general ‘real-world’ face-processing ability – that is they are “not faces”. They observed a high correlation in performance between upright and inverted unfamiliar face matching, a pattern not seen with familiar faces, which they interpreted as indicating unfamiliar face matching is qualitatively different and largely driven by image-specific factors. However, the authors cautioned that this limitation likely applies only to unfamiliar face-matching tasks for identity rather than other types of face judgements (e.g., emotion). The present study replicates and extends these findings by considering within-subject performance for upright/inverted unfamiliar face matching across various paradigms (sequential/simultaneous presentation or sorting) and face-judgement types (identity or emotion), whilst considering different types of measures (accuracy and reaction time). Our results illustrated high correlations for upright/inverted conditions were universally observed within tasks for both accuracy and reaction times. Subsequent factor analyses indicated that upright and inverted conditions loaded together into task-specific latent variables. These results concur with the conclusions of Megreya and Burton (2006) and extend to both identity and emotion matching tasks – that is such tasks exhibit low construct validity for testing hypotheses about much general ‘everyday’ face processing. We propose that researchers should carefully consider alignment between their test materials and the theoretical ‘constructs’ they aim to measure, ensuring more accurate and meaningful interpretations of their results.
published_date 2025-05-07T05:27:44Z
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