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published online 14 May 2014International Journal of Behavioral DevelopmentKlaus Libertus and Amy Needham

Face preference in infancy and its relation to motor activity  

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Face preference in infancy andits relation to motor activity

Klaus Libertus1 and Amy Needham2

AbstractInfants’ preference for faces was investigated in a cross-sectional sample of 75 children, aged 3 to 11 months, and 23 adults. A visual pre-ference paradigm was used where pairs of faces and toys were presented side-by-side while eye gaze was recorded. In addition, motoractivity was assessed via parent report and the relation between motor activity and face preference was examined. Face preference scoresfollowed an inverted U-shaped developmental trajectory with no face preference in 3-month-olds, a strong face preference in 5- and 9-month-olds, and a weaker face preference in 11-month-olds. Adults showed no reliable face preference. Motor activity was a significantpredictor of face preference in 3-month-old infants, supporting the presence of motor-social connections in early infancy.

Keywordseye tracking, face processing, infancy, motor development

Faces provide important information about another persons’ iden-

tity, interests, mood, and possibly also intentions. Learning to use

the information provided in a face is important for social develop-

ment and attending to faces early in life is thought to play an impor-

tant role in social learning and in shaping the brain circuits involved

in the ‘‘social brain’’ (Johnson, 2005). Therefore, establishing when

infants show a reliable preference for faces, and what factors influ-

ence their attention towards faces, can inform our understanding of

infants’ social-cognitive development.

Face preference at birth

Using simple visual-orienting paradigms, a preference for faces has

been observed already in newborns (Goren, Sarty, & Wu, 1975;

Johnson, Dziurawiec, Ellis, & Morton, 1991; Kleiner, 1987;

Valenza, Simion, Cassia, & Umilta, 1996). A neonatal face prefer-

ence is not limited to humans and can also be found in chicks and

infant monkeys—even those reared without exposure to faces for 6

months or more (Rosa-Salva, Farroni, Regolin, Vallortigara, &

Johnson, 2011; Rosa-Salva, Regolin, & Vallortigara, 2010; Sugita,

2008). These findings suggest that newborns’ face preference is

independent of experiences with faces and may be explained by a

face-specific representational bias or by general constrains of the

visual system (e.g., de Schonen & Mathivet, 1989; Johnson &

Morton, 1991; Simion, Leo, Turati, Valenza, & Barba, 2007). For

example, it has been suggested that perceptual features, such as

up-down asymmetry (i.e., more elements in the upper part of dis-

play), may account for newborns’ preference for faces (Macchi

Cassia, Turati, & Simion, 2004; Simion, Valenza, Macchi Cassia,

Turati, & Umilta, 2002; Turati, Simion, Milani, & Umilta, 2002).

However, experiences quickly begin to shape face preferences and

after only 4 days, newborns begin to show a preference for their moth-

er’s face over a stranger’s face, and this preference varies as a function

of infants’ exposure to their mother (I. W. R. Bushnell, 2001;

I. W. R. Bushnell, Sai, & Mullin, 1989; Field, Cohen, Garcia, &

Greenberg, 1984; Pascalis, de Schonen, Morton, Deruelle, &

Fabre-Grenet, 1995).

Face preference following the newborn period

While infants seem more interested in faces than in other visual

stimuli, a preference for faces over other salient visual stimuli

has not been reported consistently in the 2 months following

the newborn period. On the one hand, there is evidence for a

face preference in 3-month-old infants when comparing photo-

graphic images of faces to scrambled faces, or in the presence

of face-like movements (Ichikawa, Tsuruhara, Kanazawa, &

Yamaguchi, 2013; Macchi Cassia, Kuefner, Westerlund, & Nelson,

2006; Simion et al., 2007; Turati, Valenza, Leo, & Simion, 2005).

On the other hand, Johnson, Ellis, and Morton (1991) reporteda decline

in preferential face tracking in 2-month-old infants, and a number of

other studies observed no clear preference for face over competing

images in 1–3-month-olds (e.g., Chien, 2011; Dannemiller &

Stephens, 1988; Keller & Boigs, 1991; Maurer & Barrera,

1981; Wilcox, 1969).

An extensive review of some early studies on infants’ face prefer-

ence suggests that no face preference is evident in infants younger

than 4 months of age when static faces alongside competing visual

stimuli are presented side-by-side for less than 30 seconds (Maurer,

1985). It is possible that 3-month-old infants require more time to

process faces and therefore do not show a spontaneous face prefer-

ence when images are presented for less than 30 seconds. Supporting

this view, faces have been shown to automatically capture attention

in 6-month-old but not 3-month-old infants (Di Giorgio, Turati,

Altoe, & Simion, 2012; Gliga, Elsabbagh, Andravizou, & Johnson,

2009). Further, it has been shown that 3–4-month-old infants require

1 University of Pittsburgh, USA2 Vanderbilt University, Nashville, USA

Corresponding author:

Klaus Libertus, University of Pittsburgh, 3939 O’Hara Street, Pittsburgh, PA

15260, USA.

Email: klaus.libertus@gmail.com

International Journal ofBehavioral Development

1–11ª The Author(s) 2014

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90 seconds of familiarization to successfully recognize a previously

encountered face (Otsuka et al., 2009).

Starting at around 4–5 months of age, infants again start to show

a preference for faces over other, highly salient, images such as toys

or cars (Durand, Baudouin, Lewkowicz, Goubet, & Schaal, 2013;

Libertus & Needham, 2011). A face preference has also been con-

firmed in 6- and 9-month-old infants using animated video clips

(Frank, Vul, & Johnson, 2009). In particular, this study reported

an increase in face preference from 3 to 9 months of age, with the

strongest face preference being evident in adults. Such changes in

face preference over the first year are likely influenced by infants’

own experiences. For example, infants’ face discrimination skills

have been shown to become increasingly specialized to human

faces over the first 9 months in a process called ‘‘perceptual narrow-

ing’’ that is dependent on the kinds of faces infants are exposed to

(Pascalis, de Haan, & Nelson, 2002; Pascalis et al., 2005).

Learning through motor experiences

Experiences such as exposure to different types of visual stimuli

play a critical role throughout development and can strongly impact

infants’ face processing skills. However, the infant is not a passive

observer, but actively moving around while exploring the world.

Consequently, the kinds of experiences infants are able to provide

for themselves are limited by their own motor abilities. For this rea-

son, motor skills have been called a ‘‘rate limiting’’ factor in infant

development (E. W. Bushnell & Boudreau, 1993).

It has long been recognized that motor experiences offer a foun-

dation for learning (Piaget, 1952) and several studies have investi-

gated how motor skills affect development across domains. To

describe how infants’ own motor abilities influence their perception

of the potential for actions offered by objects, Gibson (1988) intro-

duced the concept of ‘‘affordance.’’ Infants’ object exploration

skills have also been shown to affect their perception of 3D

objects (Soska, Adolph, & Johnson, 2010). Similarly, a growing

literature has found associations between infants’ crawling skills

and their spatial abilities such as mental rotation or spatial search

(Bai & Bertenthal, 1992; Campos et al., 2000; Clearfield, 2004;

Schwarzer, Freitag, Buckel, & Lofruthe, 2012). Together, these

findings highlight the important role played by motor skills for

infants’ cognitive and perceptual development.

Motor skills and social development

Going beyond cognitive and perceptual domains, a number of

recent studies have identified connections between infants’ motor

skills and their social development. For example, studies of

infants at high familial risk for Autism Spectrum Disorders

(ASD) have found associations between fine and gross motor

skills during the first year of life and subsequent social and lan-

guage development (Bhat, Galloway, & Landa, 2012; Bhat,

Landa, & Galloway, 2011; LeBarton & Iverson, 2013). Flanagan,

Landa, Bhat, and Bauman (2012) have even reported that head

lag during a pull-to-sit task administered at 6 months of age is

predictive of ASD outcomes at 3 years of age.

In typically developing infants, motor experiences have been

shown to affect elementary aspects of infants’ social development.

For example, facilitating independent reaching in 3-month-old

infants (via ‘‘sticky mittens’’) has been found to encourage a prefer-

ence for face (Libertus & Needham, 2011), and facilitate infants’

perception and understanding of observed actions (Gerson &

Woodward, 2013; Skerry, Carey, & Spelke, 2013; Sommerville,

Woodward, & Needham, 2005). In slightly older infants, the transi-

tion from crawling to walking has been found to alter infants’ social

exchanges with their mothers (Karasik, Tamis-LeMonda, &

Adolph, 2011, 2014). These findings suggest that new motor skills

providing infants with different ways to interact with others (such

as grasping and walking) alter their attention to and engagement

with social interaction partners. One could argue that experiencing

a new motor skill changes the ‘‘affordances for interaction’’ that

infants perceive in others.

The relation between infants’ grasping experiences and their

preference for faces is of particular interest, as grasping is an early

emerging motor milestone and early attention to faces is, as

reviewed above, critical for the development of the ‘‘social brain’’

(Johnson, 2005). Two previous studies have reported a relation

between grasping experiences and face preference, but only in the

context of training paradigms where infants’ motor experiences

were actively manipulated (Libertus & Needham, 2011, 2014).

It remains unclear, whether a similar relation exists in naıve,

untrained infants.

The current study

The first goal of this research was to investigate the developmental

trajectory of face preference across infancy and in adults. Libertus

and Needham (2011, 2014) reported no face preference in three

separate groups of 3-month-old infants, a result that contrasts with

other studies reporting a face preference at this age (Ichikawa

et al., 2013; Macchi Cassia et al., 2006; Turati et al., 2005). There-

fore, it seemed important to re-investigate face preference in

3-month-olds using the same stimuli as Libertus and Needham

(2011). We hypothesized that 3-month-olds would not show a face

preference using static face-toy pairs (Maurer, 1985), that a face

preference would be evident by age 5 months, and that this prefer-

ence would strengthen into adulthood (Frank et al., 2009).

Our second goal was to examine the relation between face pre-

ference and motor development. Libertus and Needham (2011)

reported that scaffolded reaching experiences (‘‘sticky mittens’’)

increased infants’ face preference. In a more recent study, the same

authors report that experiences of actively moving an object

attached to the infant’s hand also encouraged their preference for

faces (Libertus & Needham, 2014). However, it is possible that the

interactive exchanges during these training procedures, rather than

the motor experiences themselves, encouraged a preference for

faces in their study. The current study addresses this issue by exam-

ining the relation between face preference and a parent-report mea-

sure of motor activity in naıve, untrained infants. Activity level is

inversely related to infants’ ability to control and focus their own

limb movements, which in turn predicts the onset of successful

grasping (Thelen et al., 1993). If face preference were indeed

related to aspects of infants’ grasping skills (as suggested by the

findings of Libertus & Needham, 2011), one would expect to

observe a similar relation between infants’ motor activity level and

their preference for faces. Such a motor-social relation could be dri-

ven by changes in what opportunities for social interactions infants

perceive in others depending on their own ability to control their

limb movements. For example, once infants engage in independent

grasping, opportunities for sharing games and triadic exchanges

with others open up (Striano & Reid, 2006).

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Methods

Participants

A total of 75 full-term infants and 23 adults participated in this

experiment. Infants were divided into five groups based on their

age: 20 children aged 3 months, 19 children aged 5 months, 18 chil-

dren aged 9 months, and 18 children aged 11 months. All partici-

pants came from a middle- to upper-class background, full

participant details can be found in Table 1. Eleven additional parti-

cipants were recruited (2 adults, 9 infants) but excluded from the

final sample due to technical difficulties (1 adult), calibration fail-

ure resulting inaccurate tracking and data loss (1 adult, 7 infants),

and due to prematurity (2 infants).

Infant participants were recruited from public birth records. Par-

ents received $5 travel reimbursement and an infant-sized t-shirt as

gift for their participation. Adult participants were undergraduate

students at a major research university and received course credit

for their participation. The university Institutional Review Board

approved the research protocol and informed consent was obtained

(from a parent or legal guardian for infants) prior to testing.

Although all infants were born after 37 weeks of gestation, age was

recorded as post-menstrual age (PMA) based on parent report (van

der Fits, Klip, van Eykern, & Hadders-Algra, 1999).

Procedure

Testing was completed in a small, dimly lit room. Adults were

seated in a stable chair; infants were seated in a reclined bouncy

chair, a stable high chair, or on a caregiver’s lap at a distance of

about 60 cm from a Tobii 1750 remote cornea-reflection eye-

tracker with a 50 Hz sampling rate. At the beginning of the experi-

ment, a 9-point calibration procedure was performed. Tracking

quality and drift was monitored throughout the experiment using

a recurring central fixation stimulus.

Stimuli

All stimuli were presented sequentially on a 17" screen (33.4

� 25.4 degrees of visual angle) at a resolution of 1024� 786 pixels.

Sample stimuli are shown in Figure 1. To facilitate comparisons of

our results with previous studies that only used the Face-Preference

Task (Libertus & Needham, 2011), infants first completed the Face-

Preference Task and then the Visual Acuity Task.

Face-preference task. Stimuli used in the face-preference task con-

sisted of colored photographs of faces and infant toys displayed

side-by-side for a fixed trial-duration of 10 seconds on a white

background (Figure 1) followed by a 1-second central fixation sti-

mulus. Two male and two female faces showing neutral expressions

were selected from the NimStim database (Tottenham et al., 2009)

and were each paired with a different toy to create four unique face-

toy pairs. The same stimuli were used by Libertus and Needham

(2011, 2014) and by DeNicola, Holt, Lambert, and Cashon

(2013). Side of face presentation was counterbalanced. Faces or

toys were not equated for visual saliency but were of similar lumi-

nance (DeNicola et al., 2013).

Visual acuity. Maturity of the visual system, in particular the ability

to perceive high-spatial frequency content, is likely to influence

infants’ face preferences. To account for differences in visual acuity

across the large age-range tested here, a High-Spatial Frequency

(HSF) preference task was included. This task estimates prefer-

ences for high- vs. low-spatial frequency information in faces using

a preferential looking paradigm identical to the face-preference

task. Gray scale photographs of one male and one female face

selected from the NimStim database (Tottenham et al., 2009) were

modified using low-pass, and high-pass filters in Adobe Photo-

shop1. For each face, the Low-Spatial Frequency (LSF) and the

High-Spatial Frequency (HSF) version were then presented side-

by-side for fixed trial-duration of 10 seconds on a white background

(Figure 1) followed by a 1-second central fixation stimulus. Each

face identity was presented twice, counterbalancing for the side

of the HSF image (total of 4 presentations).

Activity level. Parents of all infants were asked to complete the

Infant Behavior Questionnaire (IBQ, Rothbart, 1981). From the

IBQ, the activity level temperament dimension was used to provide

an estimate of the child’s overall motor activity level (e.g., general

limb movements, locomotion) and their ability to control and focus

these movements. IBQ data is missing for two 11-month-old

infants.

Analyses

Due to the large age range of the participants tested here (ranging

from 3 months to 21 years of age), an assumption free approach

to analyze eye gaze was used. Instead of defining fixations using

an arbitrary filter algorithm, raw eye-gaze was used as a time-

varying signal recorded at 50 Hz. Blinks were treated as missing

data. Previous findings suggest that fixation and raw gaze results

yield similar results (Tichacek, 2004). To be included in the final

analyses, infants had to look at the screen for at least 25% of cumu-

lative time for each task (face preference or HSF preference). On

the face-preference task, all infants met this criterion. Two infants

Table 1. Participant demographic information

Group n #F Race Age (days) Parent education Birth weight

3-month-olds 20 10 16C, 2B, 2A 100.35 (8.03) 8.95 (2.39) 3490 (504)

5-month-olds 19 10 15C, 3B, 1M 144.11 (16.81) 9.06 (2.53) 3445 (393)

9-month-olds 18 7 15C, 3A 257.53 (18.48) 9.93 (1.94) 3354 (492)

11-month-olds 18 9 16C, 2B 334.08 (12.42) 8.88 (2.12) 3335 (444)

Adults 23 14 – 20.83 (1.17) years – –

Note. The total number of participants in each group (n) and the number of female participants per group (#F) are group totals. All other values are group averages withstandard deviations given in parentheses. Age is reported in days except for the adult group where age is reported in years. Education level of the parents was assessedon a scale from 0–6 for each parent separately and added (max 12). Parent education, race and birth weight data were not obtained from adult participants. Raceabbreviations: C ¼ Caucasian, B ¼ Black or African American, A ¼ Asian, M ¼ More than one race.

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were excluded from analyses for the HSF-preference task because

they failed to reach this minimum criterion (one 9-month-old and

one 11-month-old infant).

Face preference was assessed by calculating the proportion

of looking time to the face or the toy using two rectangular Areas

of Interests (AOIs) centered over the face and toy stimulus. Looks

outside of these AOIs were removed from analysis (%face þ%toy ¼ 100%). A single face-preference score was then derived

(%face � %toy), with positive values indicating a face preference,

negative values a toy preference, and 0 indicating no preference

(Libertus & Needham, 2011). Face-preference scores where com-

pared to 0 using separate single-sample t tests (two-tailed) within

each age group and Cohen’s d is provided as measure of effect size

for these comparisons. This analytic approach is equivalent to using

paired t test comparing between %face vs. %toy or %HSF vs.

%LSF. Between-group differences were explored using Analysis

of Variance (ANOVA) with Group (5) as between-subjects factor,

followed by Tukey’s HSD corrected post-hoc comparisons. For the

HSF-preference task, the same AOIs and statistical analyses were

used. In addition to reporting difference scores for face preference

and HSF preference in Figure 2, proportions of looking duration

towards each stimulus are shown in Table 2. Preliminary analyses

revealed no effects of Gender (all ps > .13) and this factor was

removed from all further analyses.

Results

Face preference

Within-group analyses indicate no face preference in three-month-

olds (M ¼ 4.20, SD ¼ 45.30; t(19) ¼ 4.12, p ¼ .68, 95% CI

[�17.00, 25.40], Cohen’s d ¼ .19). A stable face preference is

present around age 5 months (M ¼ 37.76, SD ¼ 36.87;

t(18) ¼ 4.47, p < .01, [19.99, 55.53], d ¼ 2.05), seems to peak

around age nine months (M ¼ 44.07, SD ¼ 39.30; t(17) ¼ 4.76,

p < .01, [24.52, 63.61], d ¼ 2.24), and weakens somewhat by

age 11 months (M ¼ 24.66, SD ¼ 23.61; t(17) ¼ 4.43, p < .01,

[12.91, 36.4], d ¼ 2.09). These results are summarized in Figure

2. In adults, no significant face preference was observed (M ¼8.90, SD ¼ 35.36; t(22) ¼ 1.21, p ¼ .24, [�6.39, 24.20], d ¼.50). However, visual inspection of the horizontal eye-gaze posi-

tion over time (Figure 3) indicates that adults show a rapid face

preference during the first 500 ms following stimulus onset.

A between-subject ANOVA revealed significant differences

in face preference between the 5 age groups, F(4, 93) ¼ 4.37,

p < .01, �2 ¼ .16. Post-hoc comparisons indicated a stronger face

preference in 5-month-olds compared to 3-month-olds (p ¼ .04,

[0.66, 66.46], Cohen’s d ¼ .83), in 9-month-olds compared to

3-month-olds (p ¼ .01, [6.50, 73.23], d ¼ .96), and in 9-month-

olds compared to adults (p ¼ .03, [2.85, 67.48], d ¼ .97). No other

comparisons were significant.

HSF preference

Within-group analyses revealed no HSF preference in 3-month-old

(M¼�3.47, SD¼ 36.45; t(19)¼�0.43, p¼ .68, 95% CI [�20.53,

13.59], Cohen’s d ¼ �.19), or 5-month-old infants (M ¼ �0.17,

SD ¼ 35.16; t(18) ¼ �0.02, p ¼ .98, [�17.12, 16.78], d ¼ .01).

A significant HSF preference was observed in 9-month-olds

(M ¼ 20.27, SD ¼ 34.57; t(16) ¼ 2.42, p ¼ .03, [2.5, 38.05],

d ¼ 1.17), 11-month-olds (M ¼ 21.65, SD ¼ 24.43; t(16) ¼ 3.65,

p < .01, [9.09, 34.22], d ¼ 1.77), and in adults (M ¼ 36.49,

SD ¼ 31.37; t(22) ¼ 5.58, p < .01, [22.91, 50.06], d ¼ 2.33).

These results are summarized in Figure 2.

A between-subject ANOVA revealed significant main effect of

Group, F(4, 91) ¼ 5.36, p < .01, �2 ¼ .19. Post-hoc comparisons

indicate a stronger HSF preference in adults compared to 3-month-

olds (p < .01, [12.06, 67.87], Cohen’s d ¼ .1.21), and in adults com-

pared to 5-month-olds (p < .01, [8.37, 64.96], d ¼ .1.13). No other

group comparisons were significant (all ps > .14).

Activity level

Infants’ motor activity level was assessed via parent report using

the IBQ (Rothbart, 1981). A between-subject ANOVA revealed

a significant main effect of Group, F(3, 69) ¼ 7.73, p < .01,

�2 ¼ .25. Post-hoc comparisons indicated that 3-month-olds

(M ¼ 3.71, SD ¼ 0.98) showed lower activity-level scores than

both 9-month-old (M ¼ 4.61, SD ¼ 0.71; p < .01, 95% CI

[�1.52, �0.27], Cohen’s d ¼ �1.06) and 11-month-old infants

(M ¼ 4.75, SD ¼ 0.44; p < .01, [-1.69, �0.40], d ¼ �1.36).

No other comparisons were significant.

Relation between motor activity and face preference

The relation between motor activity level and face preference

was assessed separately in 3-month-old infants (as in Libertus

& Needham, 2011) and in the older infants combined using a

regression model with face-preference as dependent variable and

activity level as predictor while simultaneously controlling for

Figure 1. Example of the stimuli used during the face-preference task (a) and High-Spatial Frequency (HSF) preference task (b)

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demographic variables (age, birth weight, parent education, and

gender), and HSF preference (as estimate for visual acuity).

Together, activity level, demographic factors, and HSF prefer-

ence explained a significant proportion of variation in 3-month-

olds’ preference for faces, F(6, 13) ¼ 4.25, p ¼ .01, R2Adj ¼ .51.

Activity level was a significant predictor for face preference above

and beyond all other predictors in the model and uniquely

accounted for 27% of the variance in 3-month-old infants’ face pre-

ference, t(13) ¼ �3.23, p < .01, b ¼ �.61, � R2 ¼ .27 (Figure 4).

Other significant predictors in this model were Age, t(13) ¼ 2.57,

p¼ .02, and HSF preference, t(13)¼�2.57, p¼ .02. That HSF pre-

ference is a significant predictor of infants’ face preference indi-

cates that visual acuity affects face preference in early infancy.

Together, these findings confirm and extend previous results

suggesting a relation between motor and social development in

3-month-old infants (Libertus & Needham, 2011).

The same regression model was used to examine the relation

between face preference and activity level in the remaining

infant groups combined. In these older infants, the model failed

to reach significance despite the larger sample size, F(6, 43) ¼ 1.31,

p¼ .27, R2Adj¼ .04, and activity level was not a significant predictor

of face preference t(43) ¼ �1.20, p ¼ .24, b ¼ �.19.

In summary, our results suggest a relation between motor

activity and face preference in 3-month-old infants. Changes in

infants’ motor activation have been found to predict the onset of

independent grasping skills (Thelen et al., 1993) and may therefore

increase infants’ awareness of others as social interaction partners.

No such relation was observed in older infants, possibly due to

reduced variability in infants’ face preference scores and motor

activity scores (i.e., most older infants show a strong face prefer-

ence, see Figure 2).

Discussion

The present study reports three main findings. First, we demonstrate

that 3-month-old infants do not show a reliable preference for faces

when photographic images of faces and toys are presented briefly

(10 seconds). This finding confirms previous studies using similar

paradigms and suggests a dip in spontaneous face preference

around the third month (Johnson et al., 1991; Keller & Boigs,

1991; Maurer, 1985). Second, our results show a significant prefer-

ence for faces over highly salient toys by 5 months of age, with a

peak around 9 months. This pattern agrees with other reports on

infants’ face preference and suggests that a strong face bias exists

in mid infancy (DeNicola et al., 2013; Frank et al., 2009). And third,

we report a relation between 3-month-olds’ motor activity and their

emerging preference for faces. The observed negative relation

between motor activity and face preference seems to contradict

Libertus and Needham (2011, 2014), who reported a positive rela-

tion between successful grasping and face preference. However,

these findings are compatible as high levels of motor activity are

likely inversely related to successful reaching, which requires

slower and controlled arm movements (Thelen et al., 1993). One

possible explanation for this motor-social connection is a change

in infants’ perception of people as potential interaction partners

following the onset of independent grasping.

Face preference at age 3 months and beyond

Our results show a dip in infants’ spontaneous face preference

around the third month, followed by an increase in face preference.

Figure 2. Mean face preference and HSF preference scores by age group. Error bars represent SEM. * p < .05, one-sample t test (2-tailed).

Table 2. Proportion of looking time by stimulus type

Group Face (SD) Toy (SD) HSF (SD) LSF (SD)

3-month-olds 52.20 (22.65) 47.90 (22.65) 48.26 (18.23) 51.74 (18.23)

5-month-olds 68.88 (18.43) 31.12 (18.43) 49.91 (17.58) 50.09 (17.58)

9-month-olds 72.03 (19.65) 27.97 (19.65) 60.13 (17.29) 39.87 (17.29)

11-month-olds 62.33 (11.81) 37.67 (11.81) 60.83 (12.22) 39.17 (12.22)

Adults 54.45 (17.68) 45.55 (17.68) 68.25 (15.69) 31.75 (15.69)

Note. Face þ toy ¼ 100% and HSF þ LSF ¼ 100%. All values are group averageswith standard deviations given in parentheses.

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This finding is surprising, as others reliably reported a face prefer-

ence in 3-month-old infants (e.g., Chien, 2011; Ichikawa et al.,

2013; Macchi Cassia et al., 2006). However, our negative findings

of a preference for faces in 3-month-old infants do not undermine

the fact that 3-month-old infants are able to process faces. In fact,

several studies show that 3-month-old infants’ face processing

skills are highly sophisticated. For example, by 3 months of age

infants show evidence for holistic face processing (Turati, Di

Giorgio, Bardi, & Simion, 2010), face specific representations

(de Haan, Johnson, Maurer, & Perrett, 2001; Macchi Cassia

et al., 2006; Turati et al., 2005), preferences for faces of their own

or primarily exposed ethnic group (Kelly et al., 2007, 2005), a prefer-

ence for human faces over monkey faces (Di Giorgio, Leo, Pascalis,

& Simion, 2012; Heron-Delaney, Wirth, & Pascalis, 2011), and a

Figure 3. Horizontal eye-gaze position during face-preference task by time. Starting at 5 months, all infant groups show a preference for faces over toys.

Adults show no overall face preference but rapid orienting to faces in the first 500 ms. Gray shaded area represents SEM.

6 International Journal of Behavioral Development

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preference for faces of the gender of their primary caregiver (Quinn

et al., 2008). Further, brain-imaging studies suggest that a cortical

specialization for faces is already present around this age (Halit, de

Haan, & Johnson, 2003; Tzourio-Mazoyer et al., 2002). Conse-

quently, our negative findings with 3-month-old infants may have

been influenced by other factors such as the duration of stimulus pre-

sentation or the relative saliency of the competing visual stimuli. In

particular, it has been reported that infants prefer ‘‘attractive’’ (e.g.,

symmetric) faces (Hoss & Langlois, 2003; Slater et al., 1998) and

it is possible that the objects used in the current study were perceived

as ‘‘attractive’’ by 3-month-old infants because most of the objects

were symmetrical. Further, Maurer (1985) has identified stimulus

duration as a critical factor influencing face preference and notes that

face preference is absent at this age when short stimulus durations (<

30 seconds) are used. Libertus and Needham (2011, 2014) reported

no face preference in three independent groups of 3-month-old

infants (mean ages 88.27 days, 90.51 days, and 92.61 days, respec-

tively) using short trial durations (10 seconds) and photorealistic

images of faces and toys. Our results confirm this pattern in slightly

older infants (mean age 100.35 days). It is possible that 3-month-old

infants would require more time to process the information provided

in a face to show a reliable preference (Otsuka et al., 2009).

Going beyond the third month, our results suggest an initial

increase in face preference followed by a decline after 9 months

of age. We did not observe evidence for an overall face preference

in adults – although adults did show a strong bias to look more at

faces at the beginning of each trial. This pattern differs from the

findings reported by Frank and colleagues (2009) who used ani-

mated videos as stimuli. It is possible that older infants and adults

require less time to process static faces and consequently disengage

attention faster. Indeed, the face preference time course shown in

Figure 3 reveals that adults show a reliable face preference during

the first second of stimulus presentation. Faces in animated videos

require more processing and therefore elicit a prolonged face pre-

ference in adults.

Connections between motor and social development

The current study suggests that infants’ motor activity predicts their

preference for faces, at least in the context used here. This relation

may seem surprising, but is in agreement with a number of other

studies that have identified connections between motor and social

development. For example, following the onset of locomotion

infants showed more emotional expressions and engaged in more

interactive social exchanges with their caregivers (Biringen, Emde,

Campos, & Appelbaum, 1995; Clearfield, 2011). Similarly, being

able to carry and share objects during upright locomotion has been

reported to change infants’ social interaction bids and parents’

responses to these bids (Karasik et al., 2011, 2013). Collectively,

these findings demonstrate that dynamic social exchanges require

certain motor skills and that the child’s own motor skills influence

social engagement from others.

With regard to grasping experiences, training studies using

‘‘sticky mittens’’ have been shown to change infants’ action percep-

tion and action understanding (Gerson & Woodward, 2013; Skerry

et al., 2013; Sommerville et al., 2005). More relevant to the current

study, Libertus and Needham (2011, 2014) reported that 3-month-

olds’ own grasping skills (directly observed) predicted their prefer-

ence for faces. Our findings support this result by showing that

infants’ motor activity level—which has been associated with the

onset of successful grasping (Thelen et al., 1993)—predicts face

preference in three-month-old infants.

Interaction affordances

It remains unclear why grasping experiences would affect infants’

attention towards faces as suggested by our results. As infants

acquire new motor skills, their perception of the potential for

actions offered by objects changes. To describe this phenomenon,

Gibson (1988) introduced the concept of ‘‘affordance.’’ Affor-

dances reflect the fit between a child’s abilities and the opportuni-

ties provided by the environment to utilize these skills (Gibson &

Pick, 2000). For example, 4–5-month-old infants who already

engage in independent reaching have been found to attempt reach-

ing only when they perceive an object to be close enough to succeed

with their reach (Rochat & Goubet, 1995; Yonas & Hartman,

1993). Similarly, it has been shown that reaching attempts in

4–6-month-old infants are guided by object size in infants with

more independent reaching experiences, while less-experienced

infants mainly attempt to touch the most visually salient object

(Libertus et al., 2013). These two examples show that experiences

with independent reaching facilitate infants’ perception of an

object’s affordances for reaching (that is, distance) and grasping

(that is, size).

Here, we like to make a similar argument regarding infants’ per-

ception of the potential for interactions offered by other people:

Depending on their own motor abilities, infants may perceive dif-

ferent ‘‘interaction affordances’’ in faces. In the context used here,

faces and toys were both presented beyond reach on a computer

screen. This may have reduced infants’ interest in the toy, as it was

not perceived as reachable. At the same time, once infants engage in

independent grasping, opportunities for sharing and triadic

exchanges emerge (Striano & Reid, 2006). Consequently, infants

may start to perceive an affordance for social interactions in faces

that they have not perceived before and this may heighten their

interest in faces. In fact, it is likely that parents actively encourage

perceiving interaction affordances in infants who independently

grasp a toy, but not in infants who are handed a toy by the parent.

Figure 4. Relation between activity level (IBQ) and face preference in 3-

month-old infants. Unstandardized residuals of face-preference scores are

shown to control for influences of age, gender, parent education, and HSF

preference. Face preference shows a negative relation with activity level.

Libertus and Needham 7

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For example, mothers’ who observe a child picking up a toy may

respond with request statements like ‘‘What do you have there?’’

or ‘‘Can you show me?’’ whereas mothers may produce more

descriptive statements when they hand a toy to the child (such as

‘‘Look, it’s a block’’). Support for this notion comes from a recent

study by Karasik and colleagues (2014) who showed that crawling

and walking infants elicit different verbal responses from their

mothers. Future research should investigate mothers’ verbal

responses towards their 4–6-month-old infants as they make the

transition into independent grasping.

Face preference and visual acuity

The current study introduced a novel task to estimate visual acuity

development in infancy and observed a transition away from a pre-

ference for low spatial frequency to a preference for high spatial

frequency information. This developmental progression is consis-

tent with the literature on visual acuity development in infancy

(Braddick & Atkinson, 2011; Catford & Oliver, 1973; Lenassi,

Likar, Stirn-Kranjc, & Brecelj, 2008). However, until a direct com-

parison between the HSF preference task and an established acuity

measure has been performed, it remains unclear whether the HSF

preference task truly estimates visual acuity. Nonetheless, our

results do suggest that infants’ face preference depends upon their

ability to detect the detailed features present in faces. This stands in

contrast to findings with newborns, who seem to rely on LSF infor-

mation when learning and recognizing faces and show a LSF advan-

tage (de Heering et al., 2008). The information provided in an LSF

image provides only coarse, global information about the face,

whereas a HSF image offers fine local details. With increasing visual

acuity, these fine details become accessible to the infants and may

attract attention because of the increased local complexity of the HSF

stimulus (which may also require additional processing time).

Interestingly, both the HSF preference and the face preference

task used here utilized a nearly identical preferential looking para-

digm with a fixed trial duration of 10 s. However, the developmen-

tal patterns we observed in the two tasks were vastly different. This

suggests that the results of the face preference task do not just

reflect the development of visual orienting in a two-choice context.

By controlling for HSF preference in our regression analysis, we

demonstrate that the relation between face preference and motor

activity is not merely an artifact of the development of visual

orienting in general.

Limitations

The current study used a parent-report questionnaire to estimate

infants’ motor activity level and a preferential looking paradigm

to estimate infants’ preference for photographic images of faces

over toys. While researchers have used both measures widely and

successfully in the past, the limitations of these measures need to

be considered. First of all, concerns regarding the validity of parent

report measures have been raised, and it is possible that parents

under- or overestimate their child’s true ability (Bartlett & Piper,

1994; Long, 1992; Seifer, 2008). A recent study compared infants’

motor performance on professionally administered standardized

assessments to parent report and showed that parents provided quite

reliable estimates of their child’s motor skills (Libertus & Landa,

2013). Second, looking time is an indirect measure and a variety

of factors can affect infants’ visual preferences. For example,

infants in our study may show a preference for the face stimulus

because it shows a ‘‘face’’ or because it shows a ‘‘non-graspable’’

object. With the measures used here, we cannot discriminate

between these two possibilities. Future studies should investigate

this possibility more closely to determine how motor experiences

shape infants visual preferences.

Conclusion

The results reported here indicate that face preference follows a

non-linear, inverted U-shaped developmental pattern over the first

year of life with an initial increase from 3 to 9 months of age, fol-

lowed by a relative decline. Further, regression analyses suggest a

relation between motor development and face preference in

3-month-old infants and add to a growing body of evidence on the

importance of motor development for social-cognitive development

(e.g., Bhat et al., 2012; Iverson, 2010; Libertus & Needham, 2011).

Funding

Financial support was provided by NIH grant R01 HD057120

to AN.

Acknowledgments

The work reported in this article was completed in partial fulfill-

ment of a Doctor of Philosophy degree to the first author. We would

like to thank Jennifer Gibson, Katherine Rief, and Addie Price for

help with data collection, and the parents and infants who gener-

ously spent their time participating in our studies.

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