The effect of expectation on the identification of known and unknown persons

In this experiment we investigated the influence of expectation, exposure time and jacket hood positioning on person identification. Thirty subjects, all employees of the TNO Institute for Perception, participated in the experiment. They were presented with slides showing known and unknown persons who were photographed under bad lighting conditions. Limited viewing conditions considerably deteriorated subjects' performance and under these circumstances all experimental manipulations significantly affected identification accuracy. Contrary to what was expected longer exposure times impaired performance. The results are discussed in light of recent research on face recognition (Bruce and Young, 1986; Read, Vokey, and Hammersley, 1990).