ABSTRACT
The human face is one of the most complex visual patterns to which human beings are exposed in either adulthood or infancy. Because of this, the study of face recognition has provided a meeting point for scientists from a wide variety of fields: neurophysiology, neuropsychology, cognitive psychology, and developmental psychology. Although the focus of the present chapter is on face processing in newborns, we will first briefly review the literature also from adult studies. A large part of this literature has been concerned with the issue of whether faces can be considered to be special visual patterns.
