Abstract
Faces are socially very important visual objects and the detection of a change in faces is an essential evolutionary skill. It has been shown that recognizing faces in adults is attributed to configural computation. Although recent studies have shown that own-race faces are better remembered and are code more configural when compared with memory for faces of other-race faces. However, it is not yet understood whether the facial configural processing own-race bias could occur under a non-attentional condition. Therefore, we investigated to collect evidence on the configured processing of own-race faces and other-race faces under non-attentional condition by recoding and analyzing the mismatch negativity (MMN) of event-related potentials (ERPs) in the normally configured faces and distorted faces. As a first step, we recorded the vMMN elicited by configural and component coding of own-race faces and other-race male faces in Chinese participants respectively. We manipulated their spatial relations (the second-order relation configural computation) own-race faces and other-race faces, using a novel morphing method to vary difficulty parametrically. The results showed that the N170 was sensitive neither to configural distortions nor to faces' races. Besides, compare with original faces, faces with configural information changes elicited larger P200 amplitudes by Caucasian faces. It is worth noticing that own-race faces elicited larger vMMN amplitudes than other-race faces. These findings confirm that the configural computation of own-race face and other-race faces can be independent on attention. These data provided electrophysiological evidence for automatic detection of configural changes of own-race face and other-race faces under unattended conditions.