Producing facial composite sketches in remote cognitive interviews:a preliminary investigation

Justice systems around the world are increasingly turning to videoconferencing as a means to reduce delays and reduce costs in legal processes. This preliminary research examined whether interviewing a witness remotely - without physical co-presence of the witness and interviewer - could facilitate the production of quality facial composite sketches of suspects. In Study 1, 42 adults briefly viewed a photograph of a face. The next day they participated in Cognitive Interviews with a forensic artist, conducted either face-to-face or remotely via videoconference. In Study 2, 20 adults participated in videoconferenced interviews, and we manipulated the method by which they viewed the developing sketch. In both studies, independent groups of volunteers rated the likeness of the composites to the original photographs. The data suggest that remote interviews elicited effective composites; however, in Study 1 these composites were considered poorer matches to the photographs than were those produced in face-to-face interviews. The differences were small, but significant. Participants perceived several disadvantages to remote interviewing, but also several advantages including less pressure and better concentration. The results of Study 2 suggested that different sketch presentation methods offered different benefits. We propose that remote interviewing could be a useful tool for investigators in certain circumstances. © 2013 Taylor & Francis.

Look who's talking! Facial appearance can bias source monitoring

When we see a stranger's face we quickly form impressions of his or her personality, and expectations of how the stranger might behave. Might these intuitive character judgements bias source monitoring? Participants read headlines "reported" by a trustworthy- and an untrustworthy-looking reporter. Subsequently, participants recalled which reporter provided each headline. Source memory for likely-sounding headlines was most accurate when a trustworthy-looking reporter had provided the headlines. Conversely, source memory for unlikely-sounding headlines was most accurate when an untrustworthy-looking reporter had provided the headlines. This bias appeared to be driven by the use of decision criteria during retrieval rather than differences in memory encoding. Nevertheless, the bias was apparently unrelated to variations in subjective confidence. These results show for the first time that intuitive, stereotyped judgements of others' appearance can bias memory attributions analogously to the biases that occur when people receive explicit information to distinguish sources. We suggest possible real-life consequences of these stereotype-driven source-monitoring biases. © 2010 Psychology Press.

Dissociation of detection and evaluation of facial expressions in adolescence

Holistic face perception, i.e. the mandatory integration of featural information across the face, hasbeen considered to play a key role when recognizing emotional face expressions (e.g., Tanaka et al.,2002). However, despite their early onset holistic processing skills continue to improvethroughout adolescence (e.g., Schwarzer et al., 2010) and therefore might modulate theevaluation of facial expressions. We tested this hypothesis using an attentional blink (AB)paradigm to compare the impact of happy, fearful and neutral faces in adolescents (10–13 years)and adults on subsequently presented neutral target stimuli (animals, plants and objects) in a rapidserial visual presentation stream. Adolescents and adults were found to be equally reliable whenreporting the emotional expression of the face stimuli. However, the detection of emotional butnot neutral faces imposed a significantly stronger AB effect on the detection of the neutral targetsin adults compared to adolescents. In a control experiment we confirmed that adolescents ratedemotional faces lower in terms of valence and arousal than adults. The results suggest a protracteddevelopment of the ability to evaluate facial expressions that might be attributed to the latematuration of holistic processing skills.

Theoretical and applied evaluations of facial composite systems

Police often use facial composites during their investigations, yet research suggests that facial composites are generally not effective. The present research included two experiments on facial composites. The first experiment was designed to test the usefulness of the encoding specificity principle for determining when facial composites will be effective. Instructions were used to encourage holistic or featural cues at encoding. The method used to construct facial composites was manipulated to encourage holistic or featural cues at retrieval. The encoding specificity principle suggests that an interaction effect should occur. If the same cues are used at encoding and retrieval, better composites should be constructed than when the cues are not the same. However, neither the expected interaction nor the main effects for encoding and retrieval were significant. The second study was conducted to assess the effectiveness of composites generated by two different facial composite construction systems, E-Fit and Mac-A-Mug Pro. These systems differ in that the E-Fit system uses more sophisticated methods of composite construction and may construct better quality facial composites. A comparison of E-Fit and Mac-A-Mug Pro composites demonstrated that E-Fit composites were of better quality than Mac-A-Mug Pro composites. However, neither E-Fit nor Mac-A-Mug Pro composites were useful for identifying the target person from a photograph lineup. Further, lineup performance was at floor level such that both E-Fit and Mac-A-Mug Pro composites were no more useful than a verbal description. Possible limitations of the studies are discussed, as well as suggestions for future research. ^

Thermal imaging as a biometrics approach to facial signature authentication

This dissertation develops an image processing framework with unique feature extraction and similarity measurements for human face recognition in the thermal mid-wave infrared portion of the electromagnetic spectrum. The goals of this research is to design specialized algorithms that would extract facial vasculature information, create a thermal facial signature and identify the individual. The objective is to use such findings in support of a biometrics system for human identification with a high degree of accuracy and a high degree of reliability. This last assertion is due to the minimal to no risk for potential alteration of the intrinsic physiological characteristics seen through thermal infrared imaging. The proposed thermal facial signature recognition is fully integrated and consolidates the main and critical steps of feature extraction, registration, matching through similarity measures, and validation through testing our algorithm on a database, referred to as C-X1, provided by the Computer Vision Research Laboratory at the University of Notre Dame. Feature extraction was accomplished by first registering the infrared images to a reference image using the functional MRI of the Brain’s (FMRIB’s) Linear Image Registration Tool (FLIRT) modified to suit thermal infrared images. This was followed by segmentation of the facial region using an advanced localized contouring algorithm applied on anisotropically diffused thermal images. Thermal feature extraction from facial images was attained by performing morphological operations such as opening and top-hat segmentation to yield thermal signatures for each subject. Four thermal images taken over a period of six months were used to generate thermal signatures and a thermal template for each subject, the thermal template contains only the most prevalent and consistent features. Finally a similarity measure technique was used to match signatures to templates and the Principal Component Analysis (PCA) was used to validate the results of the matching process. Thirteen subjects were used for testing the developed technique on an in-house thermal imaging system. The matching using an Euclidean-based similarity measure showed 88% accuracy in the case of skeletonized signatures and templates, we obtained 90% accuracy for anisotropically diffused signatures and templates. We also employed the Manhattan-based similarity measure and obtained an accuracy of 90.39% for skeletonized and diffused templates and signatures. It was found that an average 18.9% improvement in the similarity measure was obtained when using diffused templates. The Euclidean- and Manhattan-based similarity measure was also applied to skeletonized signatures and templates of 25 subjects in the C-X1 database. The highly accurate results obtained in the matching process along with the generalized design process clearly demonstrate the ability of the thermal infrared system to be used on other thermal imaging based systems and related databases. A novel user-initialization registration of thermal facial images has been successfully implemented. Furthermore, the novel approach at developing a thermal signature template using four images taken at various times ensured that unforeseen changes in the vasculature did not affect the biometric matching process as it relied on consistent thermal features.

Classificação de atividade eletromiográfia facial de indivíduos saudáveis e com hanseníese por meio de máquina de vetores de suporte

A number of studies in the areas of Biomedical Engineering and Health Sciences have employed machine learning tools to develop methods capable of identifying patterns in different sets of data. Despite its extinction in many countries of the developed world, Hansen’s disease is still a disease that affects a huge part of the population in countries such as India and Brazil. In this context, this research proposes to develop a method that makes it possible to understand in the future how Hansen’s disease affects facial muscles. By using surface electromyography, a system was adapted so as to capture the signals from the largest possible number of facial muscles. We have first looked upon the literature to learn about the way researchers around the globe have been working with diseases that affect the peripheral neural system and how electromyography has acted to contribute to the understanding of these diseases. From these data, a protocol was proposed to collect facial surface electromyographic (sEMG) signals so that these signals presented a high signal to noise ratio. After collecting the signals, we looked for a method that would enable the visualization of this information in a way to make it possible to guarantee that the method used presented satisfactory results. After identifying the method's efficiency, we tried to understand which information could be extracted from the electromyographic signal representing the collected data. Once studies demonstrating which information could contribute to a better understanding of this pathology were not to be found in literature, parameters of amplitude, frequency and entropy were extracted from the signal and a feature selection was made in order to look for the features that better distinguish a healthy individual from a pathological one. After, we tried to identify the classifier that best discriminates distinct individuals from different groups, and also the set of parameters of this classifier that would bring the best outcome. It was identified that the protocol proposed in this study and the adaptation with disposable electrodes available in market proved their effectiveness and capability of being used in different studies whose intention is to collect data from facial electromyography. The feature selection algorithm also showed that not all of the features extracted from the signal are significant for data classification, with some more relevant than others. The classifier Support Vector Machine (SVM) proved itself efficient when the adequate Kernel function was used with the muscle from which information was to be extracted. Each investigated muscle presented different results when the classifier used linear, radial and polynomial kernel functions. Even though we have focused on Hansen’s disease, the method applied here can be used to study facial electromyography in other pathologies.

Classificação de atividade eletromiográfia facial de indivíduos saudáveis e com hanseníase por meio de máquina de vetores de suporte

A number of studies in the areas of Biomedical Engineering and Health Sciences have employed machine learning tools to develop methods capable of identifying patterns in different sets of data. Despite its extinction in many countries of the developed world, Hansen’s disease is still a disease that affects a huge part of the population in countries such as India and Brazil. In this context, this research proposes to develop a method that makes it possible to understand in the future how Hansen’s disease affects facial muscles. By using surface electromyography, a system was adapted so as to capture the signals from the largest possible number of facial muscles. We have first looked upon the literature to learn about the way researchers around the globe have been working with diseases that affect the peripheral neural system and how electromyography has acted to contribute to the understanding of these diseases. From these data, a protocol was proposed to collect facial surface electromyographic (sEMG) signals so that these signals presented a high signal to noise ratio. After collecting the signals, we looked for a method that would enable the visualization of this information in a way to make it possible to guarantee that the method used presented satisfactory results. After identifying the method's efficiency, we tried to understand which information could be extracted from the electromyographic signal representing the collected data. Once studies demonstrating which information could contribute to a better understanding of this pathology were not to be found in literature, parameters of amplitude, frequency and entropy were extracted from the signal and a feature selection was made in order to look for the features that better distinguish a healthy individual from a pathological one. After, we tried to identify the classifier that best discriminates distinct individuals from different groups, and also the set of parameters of this classifier that would bring the best outcome. It was identified that the protocol proposed in this study and the adaptation with disposable electrodes available in market proved their effectiveness and capability of being used in different studies whose intention is to collect data from facial electromyography. The feature selection algorithm also showed that not all of the features extracted from the signal are significant for data classification, with some more relevant than others. The classifier Support Vector Machine (SVM) proved itself efficient when the adequate Kernel function was used with the muscle from which information was to be extracted. Each investigated muscle presented different results when the classifier used linear, radial and polynomial kernel functions. Even though we have focused on Hansen’s disease, the method applied here can be used to study facial electromyography in other pathologies.

Facial affect processing inbipolar disorder:a magnetoencephalography study

Background: Identifying biological markers to aid diagnosis of bipolar disorder (BD) is critically important. To be considered a possible biological marker, neural patterns in BD should be discriminant from those in healthy individuals (HI). We examined patterns of neuromagnetic responses revealed by magnetoencephalography (MEG) during implicit emotion-processing using emotional (happy, fearful, sad) and neutral facial expressions, in sixteen BD and sixteen age- and gender-matched healthy individuals. Methods: Neuromagnetic data were recorded using a 306-channel whole-head MEG ELEKTA Neuromag System, and preprocessed using Signal Space Separation as implemented in MaxFilter (ELEKTA). Custom Matlab programs removed EOG and ECG signals from filtered MEG data, and computed means of epoched data (0-250ms, 250-500ms, 500-750ms). A generalized linear model with three factors (individual, emotion intensity and time) compared BD and HI. A principal component analysis of normalized mean channel data in selected brain regions identified principal components that explained 95% of data variation. These components were used in a quadratic support vector machine (SVM) pattern classifier. SVM classifier performance was assessed using the leave-one-out approach. Results: BD and HI showed significantly different patterns of activation for 0-250ms within both left occipital and temporal regions, specifically for neutral facial expressions. PCA analysis revealed significant differences between BD and HI for mild fearful, happy, and sad facial expressions within 250-500ms. SVM quadratic classifier showed greatest accuracy (84%) and sensitivity (92%) for neutral faces, in left occipital regions within 500-750ms. Conclusions: MEG responses may be used in the search for disease specific neural markers.

An analysis of facial description in static images and video streams

[ES]This paper describes an analysis performed for facial description in static images and video streams. The still image context is first analyzed in order to decide the optimal classifier configuration for each problem: gender recognition, race classification, and glasses and moustache presence. These results are later applied to significant samples which are automatically extracted in real-time from video streams achieving promising results in the facial description of 70 individuals by means of gender, race and the presence of glasses and moustache.

Desenvolvimento e Estudo da Validade Facial do Questionário de Motivações para Revelar/Não Revelar a Parentalidade Não-Genética por Doação de Gâmetas

Introdução: A parentalidade é um papel muito valorizado socialmente. No entanto, para casais com infertilidade o desempenho deste papel pode implicar tratamentos de fertilidade, alguns deles com recurso a gâmetas de dador. Para os casais que recorrem a gâmetas de dador, surge uma outra preocupação: contar à criança a origem da sua conceção ou manter segredo. Ainda que as motivações que influenciam este processo de decisão tenham sido alvo de estudo, em Portugal a investigação relativa a este tema é escassa. Objetivos: A presente investigação pretendeu desenvolver e estudar a validade facial do Questionário de Motivações para Revelar/Não Revelar a Parentalidade não Genética por Doação de Gâmetas (QMRDG), o qual se destina a avaliar as principais motivações que influenciam o processo de tomada de decisão dos pais que recorrem a gâmetas de dador relativamente a contar ou não contar ao/à seu/sua filho/a a origem da sua conceção. Pretendeu-se ainda explorar a relação entre os sintomas emocionais negativos e o sentido de competência parental nos diferentes grupos em estudo (pais que já contaram à criança, pais que decidiram não contar e pais que ainda não contaram). Metodologia: Estudo exploratório conduzido numa amostra de 21 participantes que recorrem a tratamento de fertilidade com recurso a gâmetas de dador, tendo tido filhos resultantes desse mesmo tratamento, com idades compreendidas entre os 30 e 49 anos. Os participantes preencheram um conjunto de questionários numa plataforma online, tendo o estudo sido divulgado pela Associação Portuguesa de Fertilidade. Resultados: Os dados obtidos indicam que a maioria dos pais ainda não contou ao/à seu/sua filho/a sua origem genética devido ao facto de a criança ser ainda muito pequena, encontrando-se estes com intenção de revelar à criança. Dos pais que já contaram, as motivações que mais influenciaram a decisão basearam-se na falta de motivos para omitir, na importância dada à honestidade, no direito do conhecimento das origens genéticas e na transparência no seio familiar. Face às motivações para não contar, das que mais influenciaram os pais salienta-se a pouca importância dada à genética. O QMRDG revelou possuir validade facial não tendo sido reportada a existência de itens ambíguos ou de difícil compreensão. Discussão: A tendência dos pais no presente estudo foi de contar ao/à seu/sua filho/a a origem da sua conceção, sendo também esta a tendência reportada em estudos mais recentes. Verificou-se a existência de algumas limitações no estudo, nomeadamente o tamanho da amostra. No entanto, o QMRDG mostrou possuir validade facial, podendo constituir-se como um instrumento útil na prática clínica e na investigação com pessoas que estejam a realizar tratamento de fertilidade com recurso a gâmetas de dador. / Introduction: Parenting is a highly valued social role. However, for couples dealing with infertility this role can involve fertility treatments, and for some of them donorassisted reproduction. For couples who use third party reproduction, another concern can emerge: tell the child about the donor conception, or preserve secrecy. Although arguments for decision making have been studied, in Portugal research on this topic is scanty. Objectives: The current study sought out to develop and study the facial validity of Motivations for Disclosing/Not Disclosing Non-genetic Parenthood through Gamete Donation (QMRDG), which is designed to assess motivations that influence the decision-making process of parents who use gamete donation regarding tell or not to tell to his/her son/daughter his/her conception. The existence of differences concerning emotional negative symptoms and parenting sense of competence in three groups (parents that already disclosed, parents that decided not to disclose and parents that did not decide what to do) was also explored. Methods: This exploratory study was conducted in sample of 21 participants who undergone third-party reproduction treatment and became parents. Participants´ age ranged from 30 to 49 years. Participants completed a set of questionnaires through an online platform. The study was advertised by Associação Portuguesa de Fertilidade. Results: Data showed that most parents did not disclose to their child their donor conception due to the fact that the child is still very young, but their intention seems to be to disclose in the future. For parents who have disclosed, core motivations for that decision are based on the lack of reasons for omitting, on the importance of honesty, on the right to know genetic origins and on transparency in the family. Concerning motivations for not disclosing the little importance given to genetics emerges as one of the most important ones. QMRDG revealed good facial validity. The existence of ambiguous or difficult to understand items has not been reported. Discussion: In our study parent’s tendency was to disclose to his/her son/daughter his/her donor conception and this is also the trend reported in recent studies. There are some methodological limitations that should be considered mainly due to the sample size. However, the QMRDG proved to be an instrument showing facial validity, and it can be a useful tool in clinical practice and research with people who are pursuing fertility treatment with gamete donation.

Hmx1 Function In Lateral Facial Development

Thesis (Master's)--University of Washington, 2016-08

Déficit del procesamiento facial en los trastornos del espectro autista: ¿causa o consecuencia del impedimento social?

El autismo es un trastorno caracterizado por un funcionamiento cognitivo anormal principalmente en la comunicación y la interacción social. Aunque aun se sabe muy poco sobre la patología de los procesos subyacentes a este déficit, en distintos estudios se ha observado que el déficit social que presentan estos sujetos suele ir acompañado de dificultades en el procesamiento de rostros. Diferentes autores sugieren que la amígdala junto a otras estructuras cerebrales responsables del procesamiento facial y emocional estarían funcionando inadecuadamente en esta población y que existiría una estrecha relación entre los déficits en el comportamiento social y comunicacional y el procesamiento facial. Por este motivo, en el presente trabajo se pretende realizar una revisión de las manifestaciones clínicas que presentan distintos sujetos con diagnostico de autismo evaluados en diversos estudios científicos. Además, revisaremos los modelos teóricos que pretenden explicar el déficit del procesamiento facial y su relación con el inadecuado funcionamiento social y comunicacional de las personas autistas.

Competition-related factors directly influence preferences for facial cues of dominance in allies

Alliance formation is a critical dimension of social intelligence in political, social and biological systems. As some allies may provide greater ‘leverage’ than others during social conflict, the cognitive architecture that supports alliance formation in humans may be shaped by recent experience, for example in light of the outcomes of violent or non-violent forms intrasexual competition. Here we used experimental priming techniques to explore this issue. Consistent with our predictions, while men’s preference for dominant allies strengthened following losses (compared to victories) in violent intrasexual contests, women’s preferences for dominant allies weakened following losses (compared to victories) in violent intrasexual contests. Our findings suggest that while men may prefer dominant (i.e. masculine) allies following losses in violent confrontation in order to facilitate successful resource competition, women may ‘tend and befriend’ following this scenario and seek support from prosocial (i.e. feminine) allies and/or avoid the potential costs of dominant allies as long-term social partners. Moreover, they demonstrate facultative responses to signals related to dominance in allies, which may shape sex differences in sociality in light of recent experience and suggest that intrasexual selection has shaped social intelligence in humans.

Relación entre la proporción áurea y el parámetro facial de estudiantes de odontología en una universidad de la provincia de Chiclayo, 2014

El objetivo del presente estudio fue relacionar los componentes de la proporción áurea con el parámetro facial de estudiantes de odontología en una universidad de la provincia de Chiclayo, 2014. El diseño del estudio fue transversal, descriptivo y prospectivo. La población de estudio fue representada por 88 estudiantes de una Escuela de Odontología, se diseñó una ficha de recolección según las medidas antropométricas craneofaciales. Se capacitó y se evaluó la estabilidad de la concordancia intra e interexaminador de los investigadores gracias a la participación de un Especialista en Ortodoncia, a fin de lograr una estandarización en las mediciones, verificado mediante una prueba T para muestras pareadas. Se encontró que el 65.91% del total de pacientes presentaban proporción áurea en su dimensión externa, 48.86 % son braquifaciales, 13.64 % mesofaciales, 3.41 % dolicofaciales Se encontró que el 57.95% del total presentaban proporción aurea en su relación vertical, 42.05% son braquifaciales, 10.23 % mesofaciales y 5.68% dolicofaciales. En cuanto al perfil armónico, el 70.45% del total de pacientes no presentan proporción áurea, de los cuales el 53.41% son braquifaciales, 10.23 % son mesofaciales y 6.82% son dolicofaciales. Para el contraste de la hipótesis se utilizó el coeficiente de correlación Chi cuadrado. Para todas las pruebas estadísticas el nivel de significancia fue de <5% (p<0,05) con un 95% de nivel de confiabilidad. Se concluyó que sólo existe relación significativa entre el componente dimensión externa de la proporción áurea y el parámetro facial de los estudiantes de odontología en una universidad de la provincia de Chiclayo.