Viola Macchi Cassia
Biographic Data
| ID | 1463378 |
|---|---|
| NAME | Viola Macchi Cassia |
| GIVEN NAMES | Viola Macchi |
| FAMILY NAME | Cassia |
| SIGNATURE | CASSIA V M |
| AFFILIATIONS | University of Milano-Bicocca |
| ORCID | 0000-0002-9983-8254 |
| VERIFIED | Yes |
| TOTAL WORKS | 19 |
| TOTAL CITATIONS | 4 |
| AUTHOR COUNT | 19 |
| EDITOR COUNT | 0 |
| FIRST PUBLICATION YEAR | 2011 |
| LATEST PUBLICATION YEAR | 2026 |
| H-INDEX | 1 |
Spatial representation of serial order in working memory
The spontaneous spatialization of serial order in working memory (WM), often reflected by the SPoARC effect, is thought to be influenced by reading/writing habits. However, cross-cultural research comparing the direction of spatial organization in WM remains limited. Here we investigated the spontaneity of this spatialization (its independence from visual-spatial prompts) and its generalizability across different cultural reading systems (Italian…
Perinatal women dominantly protect—rather than submissively cede—resources when interacting with threatening‐looking others
When competing for resources, people appear particularly sensitive to social cues of threat, tending to submissively cede resources to more (vs. less) threatening‐looking others. This tendency appears especially pronounced among those that are physically weaker and thus more vulnerable to harm. One phase of adult life during which humans are particularly vulnerable is the perinatal period, the months leading up to and immediately after parturitio…
Serial-order and rule-learning abilities in children with musical training
Playing a musical instrument is an engaging, challenging activity that has been linked to benefits in several cognitive domains, including language. Insofar, these benefits have been traced back to working memory abilities related to order information, as both language and music are highly complex signals that require maintaining temporally embedded structures unfolding over time. Yet, the critical question remains open as to whether the positive…
The impact of rhythm on visual attention disengagement in newborns and 2-month-old infants
Rhythm entrains attention in both human and non-human animals. Here, the ontogenetic origins of this effect were investigated in newborns (Experiment 1; N = 30, 16 females) and 2-month-old infants (Experiment 2; N = 30, 17 females). Visuospatial attentional disengagement was tested in an overlap task where a static peripheral stimulus (S2) appeared while a central rhythmic, non-rhythmic or static stimulus (S1) remained visible on the screen. Resu…
The role of visual spatial frequencies in newborns’ processing of dynamic facial expressions of emotion
Evidence on newborns' discrimination of emotional facial expressions is scarce, and the question of what is the nature of the visual information that newborns rely on to perform such discrimination remains open. Here, we manipulated the spatial frequency (SF) content of the stimuli by selectively removing low spatial frequency (LSF) and high spatial frequency bands using newborn-appropriate cutoffs to investigate what information newborns use whe…
Newborns' Asymmetrical Processing of Order From Sequentially Presented Magnitudes
Four-month-old infants extract ordinal information in number-based and size-based visual sequences, provided that magnitude changes involve increasing relations. Here the ontogenetic origins of ordinal processing were investigated between 2018 and 2022 by testing newborns' discrimination of reversal in numerosity (Experiment 1, N = 22 White, 11 females), numerical order in the presence of redundant non-numerical quantitative cues (Experiment 2, N…
Perception of Facial Cues to Trustworthiness in Infancy
A crucial aspect of human social competence is the ability to spontaneously and rapidly infer from facial cues whether others are likely to approach us with friendliness or hostility—that is, trustworthiness. The rapid and automatic nature of these inferences has prompted the claim that they may originate from evolutionary pressures to detect potential threats, thus enhancing our chances of survival. However, the developmental origins of this soc…
Touch me or touch me not
In mammals, including humans, affective touch (AT) supports the establishment and maintenance of social connections and mitigates the effects of social conflict and ostracism. AT is used to describe slowly moving, low-forced mechanical stimulation that is frequently perceived as pleasant. In humans, AT has been addressed particularly for its role in promoting bonding and emotional regulation during early development; however, more recent studies …
Neural discrimination of facial cues associated with trustworthiness in adults and 6-month-old infants as revealed by fast periodic visual stimulation
Adults and children easily distinguish between fine-grained variations in trustworthiness intensity based on facial appearance, but the developmental origins of this fundamental social skill are still debated. Using a fast periodic visual stimulation (FPVS) oddball paradigm coupled with electroencephalographic (EEG) recording, we investigated neural discrimination of morphed faces that adults perceive as low- and high-trustworthy in a sample of 6…
Infants' visual exploration strategies for adult and child faces
By the end of the first year of life, infants' discrimination abilities tune to frequently experienced face groups. Little is known about the exploration strategies adopted to efficiently discriminate frequent, familiar face types. The present eye‐tracking study examined the distribution of visual fixations produced by 10‐month‐old and 4‐month‐old singletons while learning adult (i.e., familiar) and child (i.e., unfamiliar) White faces. Infants w…
Visual Implicit Learning Abilities in Infants at Familial Risk for Language and Learning Impairments
The ability of infants to track transitional probabilities (Statistical Learning-SL) and to extract and generalize high-order rules (Rule Learning-RL) from sequences of items have been proposed as being pivotal for the acquisition of language and reading skills. Although there is ample evidence of specific associations between SL and RL abilities and, respectively, vocabulary and grammar skills, research exploring SL and RL as early markers of la…
Electrophysiological Evidence of Space-Number Associations in 9-Month-Old Infants
Infant research is providing accumulating evidence that number-space mappings appear early in development. Here, a Posner cueing paradigm was used to investigate the neural mechanisms underpinning the attentional bias induced by nonsymbolic numerical cues in 9-month-old infants (N = 32). Event-related potentials and saccadic reaction time were measured to the onset of a peripheral target flashing right after the offset of a centered small or larg…
Rule learning transfer across linguistic and visual modalities in 7‐month‐old infants
Rule learning (RL) refers to infants’ ability to extract high‐order, repetition‐based rules from a sequence of elements and to generalize them to new items. RL has been demonstrated in both the auditory and the visual modality, but no studies have investigated infants’ transfer of learning across these two modalities, a process that is fundamental for the development of many complex cognitive skills. Using a visual habituation procedure within a …
Discrimination of ordinal relationships in temporal sequences by 4-month-old infants
Age-Related Differences in Sensitivity to Facial Trustworthiness
The ability to discriminate social signals from faces is a fundamental component of human social interactions whose developmental origins are still debated. In this study, 5-year-old (N = 29) and 7-year-old children (N = 31) and adults (N = 34) made perceptual similarity and trustworthiness judgments on a set of female faces varying in level of expressed trustworthiness. All groups represented perceived similarity of the faces as a function of tr…
Quantifying Sources of Variability in Infancy Research Using the Infant-Directed-Speech Preference
Psychological scientists have become increasingly concerned with issues related to methodology and replicability, and infancy researchers in particular face specific challenges related to replicability: For example, high-powered studies are difficult to conduct, testing conditions vary across labs, and different labs have access to different infant populations. Addressing these concerns, we report on a large-scale, multisite study aimed at (a) as…
Infants' Visual Recognition of Pincer Grip Emerges Between 9 and 12 Months of Age
The development of the ability to recognize the whole human body shape has long been investigated in infants, while less is known about their ability to recognize the shape of single body parts, and in particular their biomechanical constraints. This study aimed to explore whether 9‐ and 12‐month‐old infants have knowledge of a hand‐grasping movement (i.e., pincer grip), being able to recognize violations of the hand's anatomical constraints duri…
The own-age face recognition bias is task dependent
The own-age bias (OAB) in face recognition (more accurate recognition of own-age than other-age faces) is robust among young adults but not older adults. We investigated the OAB under two different task conditions. In Experiment 1 young and older adults (who reported more recent experience with own than other-age faces) completed a match-to-sample task with young and older adult faces; only young adults showed an OAB. In Experiment 2 young and ol…
Age biases in face processing
In this paper, I review studies investigating discrimination and recognition abilities for faces of different ages in children and adults. Contrary to the earlier assertion that own-age faces are better recognized than other-age faces (own-age bias; OAB), I discuss recent evidence for a processing advantage for adult versus non-adult faces. This evidence is interpreted as suggesting that the precocious and continuous exposure to adult faces may s…
Age biases in face processing
In this paper, I review studies investigating discrimination and recognition abilities for faces of different ages in children and adults. Contrary to the earlier assertion that own-age faces are better recognized than other-age faces (own-age bias; OAB), I discuss recent evidence for a processing advantage for adult versus non-adult faces. This evidence is interpreted as suggesting that the precocious and continuous exposure to adult faces may s…
Neural discrimination of facial cues associated with trustworthiness in adults and 6-month-old infants as revealed by fast periodic visual stimulation
Adults and children easily distinguish between fine-grained variations in trustworthiness intensity based on facial appearance, but the developmental origins of this fundamental social skill are still debated. Using a fast periodic visual stimulation (FPVS) oddball paradigm coupled with electroencephalographic (EEG) recording, we investigated neural discrimination of morphed faces that adults perceive as low- and high-trustworthy in a sample of 6…
The own-age face recognition bias is task dependent
The own-age bias (OAB) in face recognition (more accurate recognition of own-age than other-age faces) is robust among young adults but not older adults. We investigated the OAB under two different task conditions. In Experiment 1 young and older adults (who reported more recent experience with own than other-age faces) completed a match-to-sample task with young and older adult faces; only young adults showed an OAB. In Experiment 2 young and ol…
Age biases in face processing
In this paper, I review studies investigating discrimination and recognition abilities for faces of different ages in children and adults. Contrary to the earlier assertion that own-age faces are better recognized than other-age faces (own-age bias; OAB), I discuss recent evidence for a processing advantage for adult versus non-adult faces. This evidence is interpreted as suggesting that the precocious and continuous exposure to adult faces may s…
The own-age face recognition bias is task dependent
The own-age bias (OAB) in face recognition (more accurate recognition of own-age than other-age faces) is robust among young adults but not older adults. We investigated the OAB under two different task conditions. In Experiment 1 young and older adults (who reported more recent experience with own than other-age faces) completed a match-to-sample task with young and older adult faces; only young adults showed an OAB. In Experiment 2 young and ol…
Infants' Visual Recognition of Pincer Grip Emerges Between 9 and 12 Months of Age
The development of the ability to recognize the whole human body shape has long been investigated in infants, while less is known about their ability to recognize the shape of single body parts, and in particular their biomechanical constraints. This study aimed to explore whether 9‐ and 12‐month‐old infants have knowledge of a hand‐grasping movement (i.e., pincer grip), being able to recognize violations of the hand's anatomical constraints duri…
Discrimination of ordinal relationships in temporal sequences by 4-month-old infants
Age-Related Differences in Sensitivity to Facial Trustworthiness
The ability to discriminate social signals from faces is a fundamental component of human social interactions whose developmental origins are still debated. In this study, 5-year-old (N = 29) and 7-year-old children (N = 31) and adults (N = 34) made perceptual similarity and trustworthiness judgments on a set of female faces varying in level of expressed trustworthiness. All groups represented perceived similarity of the faces as a function of tr…
Quantifying Sources of Variability in Infancy Research Using the Infant-Directed-Speech Preference
Psychological scientists have become increasingly concerned with issues related to methodology and replicability, and infancy researchers in particular face specific challenges related to replicability: For example, high-powered studies are difficult to conduct, testing conditions vary across labs, and different labs have access to different infant populations. Addressing these concerns, we report on a large-scale, multisite study aimed at (a) as…
Electrophysiological Evidence of Space-Number Associations in 9-Month-Old Infants
Infant research is providing accumulating evidence that number-space mappings appear early in development. Here, a Posner cueing paradigm was used to investigate the neural mechanisms underpinning the attentional bias induced by nonsymbolic numerical cues in 9-month-old infants (N = 32). Event-related potentials and saccadic reaction time were measured to the onset of a peripheral target flashing right after the offset of a centered small or larg…
Rule learning transfer across linguistic and visual modalities in 7‐month‐old infants
Rule learning (RL) refers to infants’ ability to extract high‐order, repetition‐based rules from a sequence of elements and to generalize them to new items. RL has been demonstrated in both the auditory and the visual modality, but no studies have investigated infants’ transfer of learning across these two modalities, a process that is fundamental for the development of many complex cognitive skills. Using a visual habituation procedure within a …
Infants' visual exploration strategies for adult and child faces
By the end of the first year of life, infants' discrimination abilities tune to frequently experienced face groups. Little is known about the exploration strategies adopted to efficiently discriminate frequent, familiar face types. The present eye‐tracking study examined the distribution of visual fixations produced by 10‐month‐old and 4‐month‐old singletons while learning adult (i.e., familiar) and child (i.e., unfamiliar) White faces. Infants w…
Visual Implicit Learning Abilities in Infants at Familial Risk for Language and Learning Impairments
The ability of infants to track transitional probabilities (Statistical Learning-SL) and to extract and generalize high-order rules (Rule Learning-RL) from sequences of items have been proposed as being pivotal for the acquisition of language and reading skills. Although there is ample evidence of specific associations between SL and RL abilities and, respectively, vocabulary and grammar skills, research exploring SL and RL as early markers of la…
Touch me or touch me not
In mammals, including humans, affective touch (AT) supports the establishment and maintenance of social connections and mitigates the effects of social conflict and ostracism. AT is used to describe slowly moving, low-forced mechanical stimulation that is frequently perceived as pleasant. In humans, AT has been addressed particularly for its role in promoting bonding and emotional regulation during early development; however, more recent studies …
Neural discrimination of facial cues associated with trustworthiness in adults and 6-month-old infants as revealed by fast periodic visual stimulation
Adults and children easily distinguish between fine-grained variations in trustworthiness intensity based on facial appearance, but the developmental origins of this fundamental social skill are still debated. Using a fast periodic visual stimulation (FPVS) oddball paradigm coupled with electroencephalographic (EEG) recording, we investigated neural discrimination of morphed faces that adults perceive as low- and high-trustworthy in a sample of 6…
Perception of Facial Cues to Trustworthiness in Infancy
A crucial aspect of human social competence is the ability to spontaneously and rapidly infer from facial cues whether others are likely to approach us with friendliness or hostility—that is, trustworthiness. The rapid and automatic nature of these inferences has prompted the claim that they may originate from evolutionary pressures to detect potential threats, thus enhancing our chances of survival. However, the developmental origins of this soc…
The impact of rhythm on visual attention disengagement in newborns and 2-month-old infants
Rhythm entrains attention in both human and non-human animals. Here, the ontogenetic origins of this effect were investigated in newborns (Experiment 1; N = 30, 16 females) and 2-month-old infants (Experiment 2; N = 30, 17 females). Visuospatial attentional disengagement was tested in an overlap task where a static peripheral stimulus (S2) appeared while a central rhythmic, non-rhythmic or static stimulus (S1) remained visible on the screen. Resu…
The role of visual spatial frequencies in newborns’ processing of dynamic facial expressions of emotion
Evidence on newborns' discrimination of emotional facial expressions is scarce, and the question of what is the nature of the visual information that newborns rely on to perform such discrimination remains open. Here, we manipulated the spatial frequency (SF) content of the stimuli by selectively removing low spatial frequency (LSF) and high spatial frequency bands using newborn-appropriate cutoffs to investigate what information newborns use whe…
Newborns' Asymmetrical Processing of Order From Sequentially Presented Magnitudes
Four-month-old infants extract ordinal information in number-based and size-based visual sequences, provided that magnitude changes involve increasing relations. Here the ontogenetic origins of ordinal processing were investigated between 2018 and 2022 by testing newborns' discrimination of reversal in numerosity (Experiment 1, N = 22 White, 11 females), numerical order in the presence of redundant non-numerical quantitative cues (Experiment 2, N…
Spatial representation of serial order in working memory
The spontaneous spatialization of serial order in working memory (WM), often reflected by the SPoARC effect, is thought to be influenced by reading/writing habits. However, cross-cultural research comparing the direction of spatial organization in WM remains limited. Here we investigated the spontaneity of this spatialization (its independence from visual-spatial prompts) and its generalizability across different cultural reading systems (Italian…
Perinatal women dominantly protect—rather than submissively cede—resources when interacting with threatening‐looking others
When competing for resources, people appear particularly sensitive to social cues of threat, tending to submissively cede resources to more (vs. less) threatening‐looking others. This tendency appears especially pronounced among those that are physically weaker and thus more vulnerable to harm. One phase of adult life during which humans are particularly vulnerable is the perinatal period, the months leading up to and immediately after parturitio…
Serial-order and rule-learning abilities in children with musical training
Playing a musical instrument is an engaging, challenging activity that has been linked to benefits in several cognitive domains, including language. Insofar, these benefits have been traced back to working memory abilities related to order information, as both language and music are highly complex signals that require maintaining temporally embedded structures unfolding over time. Yet, the critical question remains open as to whether the positive…
Psychology (16 works) · Cognitive psychology (15 works) · Developmental psychology (14 works) · Neuroscience (9 works) · Cognition (7 works) · Face Recognition and Perception (7 works) · Perception (6 works) · Child and Animal Learning Development (5 works) · Cognitive and developmental aspects of mathematical skills (5 works) · Evolutionary Psychology and Human Behavior (5 works)