I'm pretty good at picking out patterns. When I look (quick glance) at a strangers face I instantly see a pattern in the relationship of their pronounced features. It's pretty easy for me to pick someone, I just glanced at briefly, out of a crowd later on.
I heard a story on npr about this. A man lost custody because he couldn't recognize his own kids.
Found it: http://www.npr.org/2015/07/10/421625696/about-face
I'm fascinated by it, but know nothing more than what I heard during this program.
I'm above average I would say at recognizing a face, my problem is putting the name with them.
I'm a face man. I remember faces of friends from 30 years ago. But names? I've worked with people for years and i can't remember their names.
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iadr wrote: At work I get pretty good at compensating- voices are distinctive at times, and the way people move is distinctive. I was rerunning IT cabling under my desk with a fireproof door which opens-in entirely blocking my view, and one of the finance guys walked up to the opening of the door, and from under my desk I was like "Hey Vance, what do you need" and he was "Hey, how did you do that- knowing it was me?" (...) Just wondered if this was something anyone on the board had experience or interest in.
raises hand Yep, right here. Describes everything I experience to a T.
I not only have a moderate level of face blindness (if I see you every day, I recognize you, but if it's only been a couple times or if it's been a few months, I draw a blank) but also names elude me. I am extremely bad with names. They pass right through me.
But I easily remember someone's voice, or the rhythm of their walk. I just can't attach that person to a face or a name. (I have "photographic" memory of music, as well.)
I'm also crazy good at remembering obscure details about things that aren't important. A car will come in, and I'll remember that we did the intake gaskets six years ago, or that we set the fuel pressure to 48psi and the boost to 17lb three years ago, or someone has done brakes on it because it had Duralast pads on it before and now it has something else... But I will forget a phone number in the two seconds between looking at it and dialing out.
A question for you, if I may ask. Do barcodes and other sets of similar items trip you up if you look at them? If I see a long string of similar things like that, I can't count them, get lost after two or three. Photographic has twelve letters but I need to count out with a pen to see that there are nine smileys in the text box.
Interesting. I've never heard of this, but now I wonder if I might have a bit of it too. There have been dozens of times my wife & I were out in public, and after passing by someone she'd say "Did you recognize that person, you went to school with them?" That was also over 25-years ago and I didn't give a damn about most of them then, but I struggle to recognize friends whom I've not seen in a long time - although after a short time it seems to come back to me.
I'm horrible with names and faces too though - I ran recognize someone, but not have a clue what their name is - and forgetful in general(hello ADHD), so I've always attributed it to that.
Like you, I remeber & recognize voices well. Even people I've not seen for a decade or more.
I've never heard of this, but I'm kind of the opposite. I'll spot a face in the crowd, and with a 100% certainty say, "I know that person" but have no idea why. I just know their face. Maybe I met them at a party in high school, maybe they rung me up at the grocery store two years ago, who knows? Some times if I really concentrate on it I can figure it out after while, but usually not.
Put me in the "remembers faces well but wishes we all wore nametags" camp. Apparently I come by this honestly however. My grandfather was so infamous for his inability to get a name right that at his 60th b-day party everyone wore "Hi, my name is.........." stickers like we were at an Amway convention.
AR glasses would be great for a person with prosopagnosia. You could have an app running that recognizes faces and shows the name of whoever you're looking at.
My wife has this, and has often said if I didn't approach her for the second time after we met she would never have been able to find me again. Once she/we figured out it was a thing about 5 years into dating, some things got a lot easier.
We found out her dislike of certain movies (think Memento or Pulp Fiction or Snatch) was because she couldn't tell the characters apart enough to follow the plot. With me narrating or with closed captions that denote who is speaking, it goes a lot smoother.
She used to wonder how anyone could go to a spouse's friend's gathering where you don't know everyone, like an extended family wedding or something, because there is no way she could learn everyone's voice quickly enough to recognize them, and couldn't understand how everyone else apparently did. She just had no idea that you were supposed to recognize people by face.
Like someone said, she is also great at recognizing horses, cats and dogs. Zero doubt there. But cars she cannot recognize at all when the colors are different. She has read articles that this is related, ad most people tend to recognize cars the same way they do faces, with headlights, grill, hood, mirrors automatically registering as a 'face' in the human brain or something. So since her brain doesn't do that, all she's got to go on is 'blue'.
What is interesting is that she says she primarily uses voice, plus hair and gait and things like that to recognize people, but pretty much cannot recognize without the voice aspect. On the other hand I can easily recognize someone a hundred yards away, walking away from me, by hair and stride. I can't fathom perpetually not knowing who is around me. This comes up a lot as we live in a small town and when some stranger starts chatting you up in line at the grocery store and your 3-year old has to tell you "mommy that's ian from our street" before you have any idea who you are talking to, it is a little awkward.
Also her best friends from high school are all the unique looking ones. In a private high school class full of blond yuppies, my wife befriended the black girl, the short-haired lesbian, the frizzy haired redhead, the incredibly pale redhead and the half-asian. And they are an inseparable friend group to this day, 12 years later. She has openly said (to me) that the reason she gravitated to them in the first place is because she could recognize them. And she introduced them to each other. Amazing how such a thing shapes your life, or many lives.
It is hereditary. Her dad has it, we believe her half brother has it due to a few drunken conversations but he wouldn't admit it. And we are fairly convinced 1 of his 3 kids has it after spending a weeklong vacation with a large group (so multiple middle aged aunts, grandmas, a nanny, friends parents, etc). More than a few times the poor kid would ask a sibling where mommy was when she was in the room, and a few times he'd approach a relative and do a double take when they spoke, then go looking for his mother - sometimes with another failed attempt or two along the way. Things kids do, sure...but there's something different about it. When you see it, you can tell he can't figure out who is who all the time, and is otherwise a very bright kid.
Thankfully our daughter is fine. My wife has been able to use her to find me in public since she was like 18 months old. She's a very handy tool. Also for finding my car - say wife is supposed to drop something off in my car while I am at work, if I didn't drive the Miata that day her choices to find my car are either read the license plate on every grey one, or she can ask our daughter "where's baba's car?" and she'll point it right out.
And the car is a dark grey bugeye wagon with very dark tint and gold wheels. Not very hard to find in a sea of silver camry and accord sedans.
I can remember faces for decades, even back to childhood. Not good w/ names at all. Job interviews are the worst, if I don't have something written down I'm prolly lost and say thank you sir/ maam. Once acquainted, repetition helps then names are remembered more easily. I have better luck remembering women's names fwiw.
On the lower end of facial recognition. Outside of a regular context, I don't recognize a lot of people unless they are people I interact with on a regular basis.
When I ran the brewery, there were hundreds of regular clients that I interacted with and kept track of their names. But if they walked past me in the mall or on the street, I would not be the one to recognize them. Makes for awkward moments.
Any woman who changes her hair and makeup on me becomes a stranger.
I would make a lousy Papparazi.
Im the same as many here, I can remember a face, and even pick out adults based on their newborn photos (and vice versa) with what I would consider a high degree of accuracy. But I cant remember a name to save my life.
The real problem for me is not being able to find what Im looking for (specific wrench, the keys to my car, my ballpoint pen etc) when its in a group of random objects (typically what is all over my workbench and such). Its a real problem when its up close. But I can spot a wrench that fell off the back of a truck in weeds on the side of the road 50 feet away, or pick out a buddy walking thru a crowd on the other side of the football stadium.
I also have a pretty notable degree of Synesthesia , for which there was a thread about a year or 2 ago on GRM as well (cant find it).
I find this stuff incredibly fascinating!!!
fasted58 wrote: .......... I have better luck remembering women's names fwiw.
Not too hard when they are all Amy. 
I'd think that it'd help with romantic relationships, every time would be like the first for you, thus you'd never grow tired of it
I have the opposite issue, faces I can recognize almost instantly but names have been a constant struggle for me throughout my life. Numbers come pretty easily to me too, I can't explain why I remember pi to 9 decimal places, I have never encountered a situation where I needed that info but there is sits in the back of my brain ready and waiting.
It's really funny when my husband and I are watching a movie and I'm all like "HEY! That's what's his name from (other show or movie)". We look on IMDB and sure enough it's the same person, but I can never remember the name of the actor or the character they played in the other movie. Sometimes I don't even remember the plots to movies unless I either really really liked the movie or if I have seen it several times.
In reply to EastCoastMojo:
Me: Hey isn't that the guy that played whatsisface in so-and-so?
Wife: Nope, wrong voice.
Done. No need for IMDB. She's never wrong either.
Interesting. I would never have thought of myself as being at all face blind. But, I have a heck of time separating and keeping track of movie characters.
gearheadmb wrote: I've never heard of this, but I'm kind of the opposite. I'll spot a face in the crowd, and with a 100% certainty say, "I know that person" but have no idea why. I just know their face. Maybe I met them at a party in high school, maybe they rung me up at the grocery store two years ago, who knows? Some times if I really concentrate on it I can figure it out after while, but usually not.
^^This is me, i can recognize a face of someone ive only seen once or twice. It annoys me until i figure out why there familiar. Names im bad at!
My mother is face blind, like mentioned above. I hear it's fairly uncommon. When someone says hello to her in a restaurant she works hard to get them talking so she might be use their voice, or the content of the conversation to recognize them.
She's told me that she recognizes me because I'm usually the tallest guy in the room. She usually picks a defining feature like long hair or such to help her recognize people.
When we are watching movies at home I'll commonly state who the character is so she'll more easily follow the plot. Comments like, "that's the cop from earlier", or "that's Jon Snow".
Unfortunately a face blind person can come off as rude for appearing to ignore someone they know, as if they were mad at them. Or not remembering the person because they were deemed insignificant or unmemorable.
The first few times I heard of 'face blindness' it sounded like a fantasy condition. I couldn't even imagine that was possible.
I'm a very visual person, and faces are the way I categorize and remember people--life would be so much harder if I was not to be able to do that. My role at work would be nearly impossible.
Stay strong, guys.
Faces I am OK with. I am name blind.
iadr wrote: I ended a 4 year relationship with someone who was a big move buff. They make *No* sense to me. Bunch of pics of shoes, a flash of someone making a face, and you are supposed to know who's who And what they are thinking? Not a chance. We had some good times watching DVD's of Boston Legal- distinctive looking characters
Regarding TV and movies, we watched a lot of cartoons early on in the relationship, that was by far her preference. For about the first 3 years I just figured she really liked cartoons, plenty of people do. Turns out a significant part of it was the easily distinguishable characters, always drawn the same way. Simpsons, Family Guy, American Dad, South Park, Futurama, etc. Even so a few times when the actor voicing a character changed it would throw her for a loop.
Now our TV time is typically going through serials on Netflix. Something like malcom in the middle with the same characters every single episode, she's fine with. Walking Dead, Downton Abby - I often get asked "ok who is that" even after multiple seasons. Characters not distinct enough.
Sometimes I don't know who a character is either but she figures it out by voice after a few lines. That's amusing. I am not great with faces myself, and if I take one of the online 'do you have prosopagnosia' tests it will give 'maybe/slightly/inconclusive' type answers. But to whatever degree that may be true, it is nothing compared to 'really' having it. It has never meaningfully affected my life, that's for sure, while it obviously has significant consequences for my wife and for you.
I am hearing impaired, though. So when we're at a large event I tell her who is talking to us and she tells me what they're saying. It kinda works.
Paul_VR6 wrote: Faces I am OK with. I am name blind.
I do this too. If I meet you, strike up a conversation, leave the room for 5 minutes and return, I will have forgotten your name. But will recognize you right away, and if I pass you on the street 5 years later I'll know I met you before. And I can always ask your name again.
View faceblindness as the exact opposite. You know you were just talking to "Bob" but if you leave the room and come back in 5 minutes, although you know damn well you were talking to Bob, you have no idea if he is still there or which guy he is. You can't go around asking everyone if they are Bob without getting a whole lotta funny looks.
That's gotta be hell to deal with.
EastCoastMojo wrote: I have the opposite issue, faces I can recognize almost instantly but names have been a constant struggle for me throughout my life. Numbers come pretty easily to me too, I can't explain why I remember pi to 9 decimal places, I have never encountered a situation where I needed that info but there is sits in the back of my brain ready and waiting. It's really funny when my husband and I are watching a movie and I'm all like "HEY! That's what's his name from (other show or movie)". We look on IMDB and sure enough it's the same person, but I can never remember the name of the actor or the character they played in the other movie. Sometimes I don't even remember the plots to movies unless I either really really liked the movie or if I have seen it several times.
This is me pretty much to a T. Great with number sequences (have my debit card/drivers license/SSN - pretty much any numerical form of ID memorized), great with faces, terrible with names, and I never remember movie plots very well. Also have a hard time recalling specific plays in a football game or something unless something very memorable happened.
One other interesting note: While I'm good with just remembering a sequence of numbers, if they are always in a specific geometric arrangement (ex. the keypad on the security system at work, the unlock code on my GF's iphone, ect) I'll remember them that way and never be able to tell you the actual digits. I also have a hard time remembering things that are spoken to me, rather than me reading them - very visually oriented.
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