Abstract
This study examined the hypothesis that verbalizing configural information does not impair face recognition. It has been shown that verbalization impairs face recognition (verbal overshadowing effect). The explanation is that while configural information is critical for face recognition. Verbalization may enhance featural processing and may therefore impede face recognition. It is then predicted that verbalizing configural information would not impair face recognition. However, mixed results regarding this prediction have been reported. In those studies, when verbalizing configural information, participants were asked to describe an impression or occupation of the target face, which could actually enhance featural processing. In this study, participants described configural verbalization condition were asked to make those judgments about the target face that require configural processingfeatural information of a target face or described configural information by rating adjectives of the face before a recognition task. The result showed that describing featural information impaired target recognition but describing configural information did not. This result suggests verbalization does not always impair face recognition.
