Gifted Issues Discussion homepage Forums General Discussion recognizing people and faces

DS6 remembers everything, except he seems to get people confused all the time. If we know people well it isn't an issue too much, but if not he gets people all mixed up. Like this weekend we went to a school function and 2 boys from his 4th grade class (he is in this class every day for about an hour and a half a day) came up to him and enthusiastically said hi to him by name. One even put his arms up either to give DS6 a hug or high five or something. DS just looked at them and walked by. no response at all. I went up to him and asked who they were and he said "I don't know." I said they must know him because they said hi to him by name and clearly knew him. Later they came up and talked to him and he responded a little better and at least acknowledged them. This has happened before, once with the girl that sits next to him in a class. He had no idea who she was. He had been in the class for a week already. Also, if he sees someone he knows well out of context, in a different setting sometimes he has no clue who they are but will tell me "they look just like _______" I will have to tell them that they are that person. It is very odd. Other times he has talked to people thinking they were someone else because in his mind they look similar. He isn't really like this with good friends or anything if he sees them regularly, but still it is quite strange. He is such a detail oriented person, I just find it weird that he doesn't pick up on distinguishing characteristics. Any other gifted kids like this?

D15 is STILL like this (and a soph in high school now!). She does have a non-verbal learning disability, so maybe this is part of that. She wasn't sure which set of grandparents was which (we saw them 3-4 times a year when she was small) for years. And she can't tell me which kids are in her classes (small school, ~75/graduating class) even a whole quarter into the year except a few of her good friends.

I'm not sure if DS8 is like this, but I know for a fact that I am! I have a terrible time with faces until I've really had a chance to get to know someone and attach a name to them. And it really amazes me when I watch something like America's Most Wanted and people identify someone down the street as the guy they saw the mug shot of on TV. I just don't make that connection from the 2d shot to the 3d face; I have no idea how anyone can identify someone that way!

My ex always called people by name, and he was frequently wrong about the name--I finally convince him that a greeting should not be, "hi, Bob" but instead "hi, how are you?" because it was most likely Frank, not Bob, and he wouldn't embarrass himself that way.

My DS8 is totally like that since preschool. It happened so many times when people are greeting to him and he has no idea who the persons are. He even didn't recognize his summer camp teacher (he spent 1hr session per day with students) after 4 WEEKS. He played with some kids (not in his class) many many times at playground and he still doesn't know their names. Even DD6 knows those kids better than him. I think he is poor on recognizing people and he has no interest to pay attention on social situation.

I definitely have a mild form of this (face blindness) - I recognise people I am very familiar with, but if I only see them occasionally, or they are out of context, it's a problem. I totally blame my dad - he was just the same I tend to remember people by hair or skin colour, whether they wear glasses or not etc. I worked for 10 summers at a camp for kids with disabilities - one of my duties was assessing the new staff and assigning campers to them - I had a terrible time remembering who was who, and usually had to hear them talk (we had alot of international staff)before I knew who they were. I never had the problem with the kids. With ds, I did notice once that in a soccer session, with kids he wasn't familiar with, that he would pair up with either the Asian or Hispanic kids (there were only a couple in the group of mainly blond haired boys) - maybe that was his way of being sure he remembered who his partner was ?

I'm prosopagnosic too, and think DS probably is too. (Don't get too excited: it's generally underrecognised, so having a number of people here doesn't really suggest it's GT-related - although wouldn't that be interesting? I always wondered whether I was doing something else with those neurons :-)

DS isn't like that and neither is DH. But I have a big dose of this. DH says it's because I don't look people in the face, so I never really "see" them to begin with. It's so much a part of my life that I expect other people not to recognize me as well, but it doesn't seem to be the case. So when someone comes up to me to say hi, I usually feel embarrassed before I switch to that, "Uh, yes, and sorry, where did we meet?"

I have always had that problem too, now I am reading it is Aspergers related which seems to also be somehow GT related

I think that's exactly why I have this problem. I don't look at people closely, and I don't pay attention. I've taken to asking, "was that you that ... " when I can't remember who the person was, which makes it sound like a bit of vagueness about the situation rather than not knowing who they are.