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Prototypes and recognition of self
Introduction
We are interested in why the image of Jesus so
drastically changed into the image we still keep
today. We showed earlier (Folgerø et al. 2016a)
that renaissance images of Jesus as God may have
utilized an enhancing effect of face and gaze
direction that rendered the images more positive.
Furthermore, we have shown (Folgerø et al.
2016b) that participants were more easily primed
to judge the facial proportions in images of Christ
as female.
The current study explores the idea that the image
of Christ has evolved to be more likable by
adapting similarity to the community of believers,
including adapting to the female believers. This is
hypothesized to increase both trustworthiness and
attractiveness. Furthermore, we hypothesized that
participants would judge more favorably images
containing their own (disguised) image.
Carla-Sophie Lembke1, Per Olav Folgerø2, Alf Edgar Andresen2 & Christer Johansson2
1Institute of Cognitive Science 2Department of Linguistic, Literary and Aesthetic Studies
University of Osnabrück University of Bergen, Norway
Method
We created four prototypes (cf. figure 1 and 2):
1. Jesus from four renaissance images of Christ,
2. female from eight pictures of female participants,
3. male from eight pictures of male participants, and
4. human from the average image of the male and
female prototype.
The last three prototypes were combined with the
Jesus prototype (cf. Figure 2). We created 16
individualized Jesus images (cf. Figure 3) that
consisted of 80% Jesus and 20% the image of the
participant. All morphing in Sqirls Morph, which
uses Beier & Neely’s (1992) algorithm.
We created a balanced hot-or-not contest in
SuperLab where an individualized picture was pres-
ented next to one of the prototypes. All pairs were
presented in a random sequence. The prototype is
presented either to the left or right at random. All
combinations were presented exhaustively.
Participants were asked to select the image they
found most attractive of the two. Reaction times
were collected, and difficult choices were expected
to show increased reaction time.
Conclusion
Further research is needed to establish increased trustworthiness associated with self-similarity.
Both female and Christ prototypes were judged as more attractive, and tend to be processed
more fluently. This support our main hypothesis on adaption of the image towards a cognitively
more pleasing image. However, we did not find that self was judged more attractive.
REFERENCES
Beier, T. & Neely, S. 1992. Feature-based
image metamorphosis, Computer Graphics.
26(2): 35–42. doi:10.1145/133994.134003
DeBruine, L.M. 2005. Trustworthy but not lust-
worthy: context-specific effects of facial
resemblance. Proc. R. Soc. B, 272, pp.919–
922. doi:10.1098/rspb.2004.3003
Folgerø, P., Hodne, L., Johansson, C.,
Andresen, A., Sætren, L.C., Specht, K.,
Skaar, Ø.O. & Reber, R. 2016a. Effects of
Facial Symmetry and Gaze Direction on
Perception of Social Attributes: A Study in
Experimental Art History, Frontiers in
Human Neuroscience, 10, September 2016,
DOI: 10.3389/fnhum.2016.00452
Folgerø, P., Johansson, C. & Andresen, A.
2016b. Transgender Priming in Medieval
Europe, XXIV. Conference of the
International Association of Empirical
Aesthetics, Vienna, Austria. August 29 –
September 1. 2016.
______________________________________
ACKNOWLEDGEMENT
A travel grant from L. Meltzers Høyskolefond
projekt 814070 is kindly acknowledged.
Results
The female and Christ prototypes won significantly more competitions. The female prototype was
the fastest to decide, which may be interpreted as being more attractive and/or easy to process.
In the debriefing, only one participant claimed to have recognized himself in the images.
We did not find any tendency for participants to rate their own image higher, rather there was
an insignificant tendency in the opposite direction. Four participants did not take part in the final
task, and one interpretation is that we simply did not have enough statistical power.
It could be that our subjects did judge their own image as slightly less attractive than the ratings
from others showed. Following deBruin (2005) suggests that the results would have been different
if we asked participants to judge trustworthiness rather than attractiveness.
ABSTRACT
We like what is familiar. A prototype contains
identifying features that make it easier to read
an image. We have carried out a series of
experiments on the recognition of the image
of Christ. We have previously shown that
positive attributes were more associated with
the image of Christ en face and with a direct
gaze, compared to portraits of men and
women in profile with direct or indirect gaze.
A second experiment showed significant
priming effects and showed that the images
of Christ were more associated with a prime
for the opposite sex, compared to images of
other men and women. Measures of the facial
width/height-ratio confirmed features of the
Christ images were in the feminine range.
The current experiment presents effects for
prototypes and recognition of self.
We morphed images, taken at least 6 weeks
before the experiment, of 16 student
volunteers, with a prototype created by
morphing 4 representative images of Christ.
Individualized images had elements from
four images of Christ and one individual. In
comparison, we had the four original portraits
of Christ and prototypes of male, female,
human, Jesus, and the three combinations of
Jesus & male, female and human prototypes.
Only 12 participants (aged 18 to 65; mean
26.4 CI[18.2;34.6]) participated in the final
experiment. Thus only 12 images matched
the 12 participants for self: 6 male and 6
female.
The testing procedure is a Round Robin Hot-
or-Not contest, where two pictures were
presented next to each other. The prototype
was either to the left or right, and both
versions were presented in random order. The
task was to choose the picture they liked best.
Reaction times were collected.
Results show that the female and the Christ
were selected significantly more often in
competitions than the other prototypes.
Reaction times show that the female
prototype was the fastest prototype to decide.
Of the individualized morphs, only one that
represented a higher age deviated. There were
no other significant differences.
Subjects did not show evidence of self-
recognition in preference or decision times.
Only one subject claimed to have recognized
their own image. This is consonant with
DeBruin (2005) who found that self is more
highly judged for being trustworthy, but less
valued for attractiveness.
In the light of our previous results, we show
that the image of Christ is associated with
trustworthiness and attractiveness, and
showing signs of androgyny. However,
participants may rate their own attractiveness
slightly lower than how others rate them.
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Figure 1: The creation of a prototype.
Figure 2: Female, Human, and Male prototypes.
The second row shows the effect of adding Jesus.
Figure 3: Individual Participants morphed with the Jesus prototype (cf. figure 1).
Alternating rows show first males then females.