Abstract
Previous studies have shown that distinctive faces are remembered more easily. However, there are two problems with such studies. Firstly, definitions of distinctiveness have been ambiguous. Second, the presence of peculiar features and facial distinctiveness are not mutually independent factors. Two experiments are conducted to investigate how the distinctiveness of a studied face influences memory for faces. Participants studied a target image and then selected one image from several candidates that varied in terms of their level of distinctiveness. The initial distinctiveness of the target image was manipulated across three levels (high, original, and low). The two experiments differed in terms of the difficulty level and the delay time. The results of the experiments indicated that when the target were of high distinctiveness, participants selected face images that were more exaggerated, although they selected images that were close to the original level of distinctiveness in the other conditions. These results suggest that facial distinctiveness tends to be exaggerated in memory when the face is highly distinctive, and that facial distinctiveness facilitates the recognition of faces.
