Abstract
Converging lines of research suggests that many developmental prosopagnosics (DPs) have impairments beyond face perception, but currently no framework exists to characterize these impaired mechanisms. One potential extra-perceptual deficit is that DPs encode/retrieve faces in a distinct manner from controls that does not sufficiently support individuation. To test this possibility, 30 DPs and 30 matched controls performed an old/new face recognition task while providing confidence ratings, to which a model-based ROC analysis was applied. DPs had significantly reduced recollection compared to controls, driven by fewer 'high-confidence target' responses, but intact familiarity. Recollection and face perception ability uniquely predicted objective and subjective prosopagnosia symptoms, together explaining 51% and 56% of the variance, respectively. These results suggest that a specific deficit in face recollection in DP may represent a core aspect of the difficulty in confidently identifying an individual by their face.