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Reducing Own-Age Bias: Does Contact Improve Young Adults’ Recognition of Older Faces?
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by Emily N. LeDonne, Christopher R. Poirier, and Lincoln G. Craton; Stonehill College
Category: Social | Developmental
The current study examined whether young adults’ own-age bias—better recognition for same-age faces than other-age faces—decreases after contact with older people. Recent evidence suggests that contact with other-race faces improves recognition memory for other-race faces (Sangrigoli, Pallier, Argenti, Ventureyra, & de Schonen, 2005). To extend this finding to the own-age bias, we tested 9 participants’ face recognition accuracy before and after they volunteered with older people and compared it to that of 8 participants who did not volunteer. Though all participants demonstrated own-age bias, interaction with older people did not reduce it. Alternative explanations for these findings are discussed.