Race Guides Attention in Visual Search
Open Access
- 22 February 2016
- journal article
- research article
- Published by Public Library of Science (PLoS) in PLOS ONE
- Vol. 11 (2), e0149158
- https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0149158
Abstract
It is known that faces are rapidly and even unconsciously categorized into social groups (black vs. white, male vs. female). Here, I test whether preferences for specific social groups guide attention, using a visual search paradigm. In Experiment 1 participants searched displays of neutral faces for an angry or frightened target face. Black target faces were detected more efficiently than white targets, indicating that black faces attracted more attention. Experiment 2 showed that attention differences between black and white faces were correlated with individual differences in automatic race preference. In Experiment 3, using happy target faces, the attentional preference for black over white faces was eliminated. Taken together, these results suggest that automatic preferences for social groups guide attention to individuals from negatively valenced groups, when people are searching for a negative emotion such as anger or fear.This publication has 34 references indexed in Scilit:
- Non-Threatening Other-Race Faces Capture Visual Attention: Evidence from a Dot-Probe TaskPLOS ONE, 2012
- The effects of emotion on attention: A review of attentional processing of emotional informationCognition and Emotion, 2010
- Attending to threat: Race-based patterns of selective attentionJournal of Experimental Social Psychology, 2008
- Social contact and other-race face processing in the human brainSocial Cognitive and Affective Neuroscience, 2007
- Multiple cues in social perception: The time course of processing race and facial expressionJournal of Experimental Social Psychology, 2007
- Priming Race in Biracial Observers Affects Visual Search for Black and White FacesPsychological Science, 2006
- The police officer's dilemma: Using ethnicity to disambiguate potentially threatening individuals.Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 2002
- The police officer's dilemma: Using ethnicity to disambiguate potentially threatening individuals.Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 2002
- Facial Expressions of Emotion: Are Angry Faces Detected More Efficiently?Cognition and Emotion, 2000
- Measuring individual differences in implicit cognition: The implicit association test.Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 1998