No face-like processing for objects-of-expertise in three behavioural tasks

In the debate between expertise and domain-specific explanations of “special” processing for faces, a common belief is that behavioural studies support the expertise hypothesis. The present article refutes this view, via a combination of new data and review. We tested dog experts with confirmed good individuation of exemplars of their breed-of-expertise. In all experiments, standard results were confirmed for faces. However, dog experts showed no face-like processing for dogs on three behavioural tasks (inversion; the composite paradigm; and sensitivity to contrast reversal). The lack of holistic/configural processing, indicated in the first two of these tests, is shown by review to be consistent rather than inconsistent with previous studies of objects-of-expertise.