| Abstract: | Recent studies demonstrated that in adults and children recognition of face identity and facial expression mutually interact ( Bate, Haslam, & Hodgson, 2009 ; Spangler, Schwarzer, Korell, & Maier‐Karius, 2010 ). Here, using a familiarization paradigm, we explored the relation between these processes in early infancy, investigating whether 3‐month‐old infants’ ability to recognize an individual face is affected by the positive (happiness) or neutral emotional expression displayed. Results indicated that infants’ face recognition appears enhanced when faces display a happy emotional expression, suggesting the presence of a mutual interaction between face identity and emotion recognition as early as 3 months of age. |
