摘要
运用事件相关电位（ERPs）技术,采用学习-再认实验任务,探讨了男性对有、无吸引力女性面孔图片进行判断和再认时脑内时程的动态变化。行为数据结果表明,男性对有吸引力女性面孔的反应时更长,再认正确率更高。ERP结果发现,有、无吸引力面孔诱发的ERP早成分和晚成分都存在显著差异,最强效应出现在大脑皮层的中前部。在判断任务和再认任务中,有吸引力的女性面孔都比无吸引力的女性面孔诱发出更大的ERP成分（分别为N300、P350~550ms和P160、N300~500ms、P500~700ms）。结果表明,男性对有吸引力的女性面孔的判断和再认存在偏好。
Facial attractiveness is of high importance for human interaction and communication （Joshua, Henderson, Jeremy, Anglin, 2003）. Neuroimaging studies found several brain areas to be differentially responsive to attractive as opposed to unattractive female faces （Aharon et al., 2001; Cloutier, Heatherton, Whalen, Kelley, 2008; Iaria, Fox, Waite, Aharon, Barton, 2008; Ishai, 2007; Kranz Ishai, 2006; Penton-voak, Jacobson, Tribers, 2004; Senior, 2003）. The brain areas responsive to facial attractiveness of potential mates include the superior temporal sulcus （O’ Doherty et al., 2003）, basal ganglia （Aharon et al., 2001） and medial orbitofrontal cortex （Kranz et al., 2006）. However, little is known about the time course of brain responses related to this process. The present study aimed to compare event-related potentials （ERPs） in response to attractive and unattractive female faces in order to determine which time periods were sensitive during judgment and recognition of female facial attractiveness for males. ERPs were used to explore temporal changes of judgment and recognition toward attractive female faces based on a study-recognition experiment paradigm. Data from 13 heterosexual males participants （mean age 22.35 years） were included in the analysis. There are 490 unfamiliar Chinese female pictures from Google. First, 80 college students rated the female pictures as attractive, unattractive and average. In the judgment task, after practice with 10 face pictures participants evaluated 84 attractive faces pictures and 84 unattractive faces pictures presented on computer. In the recognition task, they were asked to identify previously viewed faces from the initial judgment task among attractive, unattractive, and average face pictures. The results showed that attractive and unattractive faces elicited significant differences in early and late ERP components in judgment and recognition tasks. The most enhanced activity was produced in the prefrontal-central cortex. Attractive faces elicited more enhanced ERP effects than unattractive faces on N300 component and P350~550ms during the judgment task. N300 and P350~550ms are thought to reflect different cognitive functions, including perceptual closure, stimulus evaluation, decision-making and working memory during judgment tasks （Polich, 2003）. As well, attractive faces elicited more enhanced ERP effects than unattractive female faces on the P160 component, N300~500ms, and P500~700ms time windows during the recognition task. Early ERP effects such as P160 in recognition tasks may reflect not only perception-related processing of attractive facial stimulus features but also the detection of perceptual features or facial configurations, which is associated with stimulus-driven frontal attention mechanisms （Chen et al., 2007）. On the other hand, attractive female faces may have higher intrinsic reward values for males （Senior, 2003）. It is suggested that facial attractiveness processing may start prior to the LPC time window （Werheid, Schacht, Sommer, 2007）, thus in time periods that are related to stimulus-driven rather than evaluative processes. Behavior research evidence has shown that people have longer reaction times and higher accuracy rates in identifying attractive faces. Therefore, the results of this study indicated that there were female facial attractiveness bias in processing of judgment and recognition for males. It may be that attractive female faces represent reproductive fitness and mating value for males from the evolutional perspective.
出处
《心理学报》
CSSCI
CSCD
北大核心
2010年第11期1060-1072,共13页
Acta Psychologica Sinica
基金
国家自然科学基金(30870774)
211工程国家重点学科建设项目(NSKD08004)
教育部新世纪优秀人才支持计划资助项目(NCET-2008-0870)资助
