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Abstract
Numerous studies found that object recognition was sensitive to size variation between learning and testing. Recognition performance are typically faster and/or more accurate when size remains the same between learning and testing than when size changes between learning and testing. This phenomenon is known as the size congruency effect. In contrast, priming performance show a lack of size congruency effect for objects, and for famous faces. The literature presents many theoretical reasons as well as empirical results separating the cognitive processing of faces and objects. However, the literature does not present evidences of different processing for faces and objects under size variation. In an attempt to ascertain whether size processing for faces and objects share similarities, this work investigated the recognition and priming of familiar, unfamiliar and jumbled faces under size variation. More specifically, Experiments 1 and 1bis investigated the effect of size variation and familiarity in a recognition task; Experiment 2 investigated the effect of size variation and familiarity in a priming task. Finally, Experiments 3A and 3B investigated the effect of size variation and feature manipulation (possible vs. impossible faces) in a priming task. The results show that unfamiliar face recognition is sensitive to size variations, while familiar face recognition is not. Additionally, the results suggest that priming of familiar, unfamiliar, and impossible faces is size invariant. The final part of this document discusses the implications of these results for face and object perception and propose future routes to explore further.
