Presentation: Applied Issues In Face Matching: Translating ID Screening Performance from the Lab to the World

Abstract: Two pictures of the same person can look quite different; and two pictures of different people can look quite similar. Therefore, professional identity screeners routinely perform a difficult and error-prone task with and without the assistance of technological aids. This presentation will include a series of ecologically-valid experiments that investigate the efficacy and biases within ID screening tasks in both professional and non-professional samples. Findings may inform and improve real-world security settings such as border crossings, airports, and ports of entry.

Biography: Dr. Weatherford earned her PhD in Educational Psychology from Texas A&M University-Commerce and is currently an associate professor of psychology at Texas A&M University-San Antonio. In her role as director of the Memory, Attention, and Perception (MAP) Research Laboratory, she guides graduate and undergraduate students in investigations of cognitive psychology. Her specific research area involves the role of expertise in information processing, extending to more applied areas at the intersection between cognitive psychology and fields such as health, educational, and legal settings.