Jennifer L. Rennels and Andrea J. Kayl (Psychology) published "Infants and Adults Represent Faces Differently" in the journal, Developmental Psychology. Infants typically have predominant experience with women and this research showed infants formed mental representations of faces that were weighted toward the most frequently seen faces — they more easily formed weighted representations of female than male faces. In contrast, adults formed mental representations that were a mathematical average of the female or male faces they saw. These differences might be developmentally advantageous and help explain the differential expertise in infants' and adults' face processing abilities.
