The Mooney Face Task: Genetic, phenotypic, and behavioural associations R J Verhallen1, G Bargary2, J M Bosten1, P T Goodbourn1, A J Lawrance-Owen1, J Mollon1 |
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1Department of Psychology, University of Cambridge, United Kingdom |
| The Mooney Face Task is a test of face detection, which is often used and is quoted as a measure of holistic processing. We tested 370 healthy adults (235 female) of European descent, between the ages of 18 and 42 (M = 24 years) on our custom-made three-alternative forced-choice version of the Mooney Face Task. In a genome-wide association study we identified a single-nucleotide polymorphism (rs1522280, located within the gene RAPGEF5), to be associated with performance on the Mooney Face Task (p = 5.1 × 10-9): participants who are homozygous for the major allele score on average .37 standard deviation higher than participants who are heterozygous, who in turn score on average .62 standard deviation higher than participants who are homozygous for the minor allele. Furthermore, we observed significant sex differences modestly favouring males (.31 standard deviation increase in performance; p = .004), and a significant positive correlation with digit ratio regardless of sex: a higher digit ratio is associated with higher performance (r = .14, p = .028). This is the first genetic association with performance on a test of face perception. It opens the door to a new approach for understanding the perception of faces. |
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