BC Jones, LM DeBruine, JC Main, AC Little, LLM Welling, DR Feinberg & BP Tiddeman (2010). Facial cues of dominance modulate the short-term gaze-cuing effect in human observers.Proceedings of the Royal Society of London B. 277(1681) 617-624. PDF Times cited 8.
Responding appropriately to gaze cues is essential for fluent social interaction, playing a crucial role in social learning, collaboration, threat assessment and understanding others' intentions. Previous research has shown that responses to gaze cues can be studied by investigating the gaze-cuing effect (i.e. the tendency for observers to respond more quickly to targets in locations that were cued by others' gaze than to uncued targets). A recent study demonstrating that macaques demonstrate larger gaze-cuing effects when viewing dominant conspecifics than when viewing subordinate conspecifics suggests that cues of dominance modulate the gaze-cuing effect in at least one primate species. Here, we show a similar effect of facial cues associated with dominance on gaze cuing in human observers: at short viewing times, observers demonstrated a greater cuing effect for gaze cues from masculinized (i.e. dominant) faces than from feminized (i.e. subordinate) faces. Moreover, this effect of facial masculinity on gaze cuing decreased as viewing time was increased, suggesting that the effect is driven by involuntary responses. Our findings suggest that the mechanisms that underpin reflexive gaze cuing evolved to be sensitive to facial cues of others' dominance, potentially because such differential gaze cuing promoted desirable outcomes from encounters with dominant individuals.O'Connor JJM, Feinberg DR, Fraccaro PJ, Borak DJ, Tigue CC, Re DE, Jones BC, Little AC, Tiddeman, BP. Female preferences for male vocal and facial masculinity in videos. Ethology.
Watkins CD, Jones BC, Little AC, DeBruine LM, Feinbeg DR. Cues to the sex ratio of the local population influence women's preferences for facial symmetry. Animal Behaviour.
Feinberg DR, DeBruine LM, Jones BC, LIttle AC, O'Connor JJM, Tigue CC. Women's self-perceived health and attractiveness predict their male vocal masculinity preferences in different directions across short- and long-term relationship contexts. Behavioral Ecology and Sociobiology.
O'Connor JJM & Feinberg DR. The influence of facial masculinity and voice pitch on jealousy and perceptions of intrasexual rivalry. Personality and Individual DIfferences (In Press).
MJ Law Smith, DK Deady, FR Moore, BC Jones, RE Cornwell, MR Stirrat, J Lawson, DR Feinberg & DI Perrett (in press). Maternal tendencies in women are associated with estrogen levels and facial femininity. Hormones and Behavior.