Communications of the ACM
Facial Recognition Is More Accurate in Photos Showing Whole Person
Researchers have shown that humans rely on non-facial cues to identify people in challenging viewing situations, such as poor lighting.
Credit: University of Texas at Dallas
University of Texas at Dallas researchers have shown that humans rely on non-facial cues, such as body shape and build, to identify people in challenging viewing conditions, such as poor lighting.
"Psychologists and computer scientists have concentrated almost exclusively on the role of the face in person recognition," says UT Dallas researcher Allyson Rice. "Our results show that the body can also provide important and sometimes sufficient identity information for person recognition."
The researchers asked college-age volunteers to look at images of two people side by side and identify whether the images showed the same person. The researchers then used face-recognition systems to find pairs of pictures in which facial characteristics were difficult to identify. However, the researchers found that participants had trouble identifying images of the subjects' faces without their bodies.
"Given the widespread use of face-recognition systems in security settings, it is important for these systems to make use of all potentially helpful information," says UT Dallas professor Alice O'Toole. "Our work shows that the body can be surprisingly useful for identification, especially when the face fails to provide the necessary identity information."
From UT Dallas News
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