Age Estimation from Children's Faces

In this thesis, we addressed the question of whether or not people could estimate age from children’s faces 7 to 11 years of age. We found that undergraduates were able to make accurate relative age judgments for males and females, even in faces as little as two years apart, and that their performance improved as the age differences between the faces being compared increased. They were also able to make accurate absolute age judgments that increased with increasing face age for both genders. We also looked at estimate bias and while estimates were generally low in bias, the bias was in direction of the mean age of the stimuli. Additionally, we found that there is generally an advantage for male faces presented in frontal view. Finally, we looked at one possible factor influencing age estimates– facial expression. It was unlikely that facial expression was a primary cue informing age estimates.