An EEG investigation into the effects of race on rapid face categorization

• Main Author: Lu, Bo Zhen
• Other Authors: Charles Or
• Format: Final Year Project
• Language: English
• Published: Nanyang Technological University 2021
• Subjects: Social sciences::Psychology
• Online Access: https://hdl.handle.net/10356/150837
• Institution: Nanyang Technological University

In past behavioural studies, it has been widely demonstrated that the race of an observed face can have a profound effect on higher-order face processing. Through these studies, it has been observed that faces belonging to one's own race tend to be processed better than those of other races. However, little is known about how race may affect the earlier stages of face processing. In particular, the possible effect of race on face categorization has yet to be examined by past studies. As such, this paper seeks to find out: 1) whether race has an effect on face categorization; and 2) how the effect of race, if present, varies for own-race versus other-race faces in a multicultural context. To achieve this, Singaporean Chinese participants were presented with rapid sequences of grayscale and coloured images depicting objects, Chinese and/or Malay faces. Neurological responses to these images were captured using electroencephalogram (EEG), and results suggested that race effect was absent. Two different interpretations of this finding are discussed in this paper.