Age biases the judgment rather than the perception of an ambiguous figure.

ABSTRACT: Older participants who are briefly presented with the 'my wife/mother-in-law' ambiguous figure estimate its age to be higher than young participants do. This finding is thought to be the result of a subconscious social group bias that influences participants' perception of the figure. Because people are better able to recognize similarly aged individuals, young participants are expected to perceive the ambiguous figure as a young woman, while older participants are more likely to recognize an older lady. We replicate the difference in age estimates, but find no relationship between participants' age and their perception of the ambiguous figure. This leads us to conclude that the positive relationship between participants' age and their age estimates of the ambiguous 'my wife/mother-in-law'

SUBMITTER: Brouwer A 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC8060281 | biostudies-literature | 2021 Apr

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature