Marguerite
Active Member
Something for you to think about - a science TV show this evening was talking about "face blindness". They were discussing this as something distinct to autism, although like a lot of things (Obsessive Compulsive Disorder (OCD), Sensory Integration Disorder (SID)) you can get it in autism too.
While some people have face blindness in totality, they said on this show that about 1 in 100 have this at least in part and it could also have a genetic component. I got difficult child 3 in to watch this with me, easy child 2/difficult child 2 wandered past and got caught up in it as well. She reckons she has a significant degree of it. There are two main facets to it - one is inability to recognise faces you've already known before (such as famous faces, but with hair missing so as to only get cues from the face) and the second component, being able to distinguish differences between one face & another.
They did a simple test on the TV and difficult child 3 could easily distinguish differences between two faces, but he scored zero on recognising famous faces. Even a really obvious one like Ian Thorpe - very distinctive grin & chin. He also had no idea, no recognition of Cate Blanchett. I know he should know these, especially "Thorpie" or "Thorpedo" because of how he swims (feet like flippers).
easy child 2/difficult child 2 had trouble with both. She's already been aware of this and has worked out ways of getting around it in her job, where she has to be able to recognise something familiar about a customer in case they lose something and come back to claim it, for example.
Yesterday when the Scottish cousins visited, they were brought by husband's cross-cousin who lives on the other side of Sydney. She & her husband drove the young lads over to our village. Neither difficult child 3 nor easy child 2/difficult child 2 recognised the cousin or her husband, even though they last visited at Christmas, for a long visit when we were all together, plus they visit fairly frequently. Plus, the husband especially has a VERY distinctive face, especially his eyes and nose. Yet neither of the kids recognised him. difficult child 3 even introduced himself as if to a stranger, because he thought the husband (aged 60-ish) was one of the Scottish cousins (aged 23). The older man is very dark, going grey, the young cousins are redheads.
Apparently, inability to recognise faces to a significant degree can lead to a diagnosis of autism due to these kids avoiding eye contact, avoiding playing with other kids and being withdrawn in a group, because they just don't recognise the others. They talked about one little girl with an autism diagnosis who they later realised just had a problem with facial recognition (due to a problem in the right temporal lobe, where facial recognition happens). This little girl's mother realised what was wrong, when she went to check on her daughter after just having come out of the shower after washing her hair (the mother's hair). The little girl had not seen her mother take a shower; all she saw was the appearance of a woman with darker hair, pulled back severely, instead of the usual paler, fluffier (dry) hair. The little girl screamed, because this apparently strange woman was talking to her like she knew her.
Further assessment of the little girl showed that unlike normal, when shown a photo of a face this little girl's eye contact roamed all over the place, instead of concentrating round the eyes and nose. because she is so young, they've been trialling retraining and she is now doing a lot better at actually looking at the part of the face she needs to, to trigger face recognition.
So, for those of you with a Pervasive Developmental Disorder (PDD) child (or suspected Pervasive Developmental Disorder (PDD)) or if you just have your suspicions, look up face recognition or face blindness and see what information you can find.
The TV show I was watching was on ABC TV's "Catalyst" show, tonight (19 July 2007). ABC in Australia is our national TV free-to-air broadcast channel, nationwide. Commercial-free, apart from self-promotion between programs.
http://www.abc.net.au/tv/guide/netw/200707/programs/SC0602H023D19072007T200000.htm
Interesting, no?
Marg
While some people have face blindness in totality, they said on this show that about 1 in 100 have this at least in part and it could also have a genetic component. I got difficult child 3 in to watch this with me, easy child 2/difficult child 2 wandered past and got caught up in it as well. She reckons she has a significant degree of it. There are two main facets to it - one is inability to recognise faces you've already known before (such as famous faces, but with hair missing so as to only get cues from the face) and the second component, being able to distinguish differences between one face & another.
They did a simple test on the TV and difficult child 3 could easily distinguish differences between two faces, but he scored zero on recognising famous faces. Even a really obvious one like Ian Thorpe - very distinctive grin & chin. He also had no idea, no recognition of Cate Blanchett. I know he should know these, especially "Thorpie" or "Thorpedo" because of how he swims (feet like flippers).
easy child 2/difficult child 2 had trouble with both. She's already been aware of this and has worked out ways of getting around it in her job, where she has to be able to recognise something familiar about a customer in case they lose something and come back to claim it, for example.
Yesterday when the Scottish cousins visited, they were brought by husband's cross-cousin who lives on the other side of Sydney. She & her husband drove the young lads over to our village. Neither difficult child 3 nor easy child 2/difficult child 2 recognised the cousin or her husband, even though they last visited at Christmas, for a long visit when we were all together, plus they visit fairly frequently. Plus, the husband especially has a VERY distinctive face, especially his eyes and nose. Yet neither of the kids recognised him. difficult child 3 even introduced himself as if to a stranger, because he thought the husband (aged 60-ish) was one of the Scottish cousins (aged 23). The older man is very dark, going grey, the young cousins are redheads.
Apparently, inability to recognise faces to a significant degree can lead to a diagnosis of autism due to these kids avoiding eye contact, avoiding playing with other kids and being withdrawn in a group, because they just don't recognise the others. They talked about one little girl with an autism diagnosis who they later realised just had a problem with facial recognition (due to a problem in the right temporal lobe, where facial recognition happens). This little girl's mother realised what was wrong, when she went to check on her daughter after just having come out of the shower after washing her hair (the mother's hair). The little girl had not seen her mother take a shower; all she saw was the appearance of a woman with darker hair, pulled back severely, instead of the usual paler, fluffier (dry) hair. The little girl screamed, because this apparently strange woman was talking to her like she knew her.
Further assessment of the little girl showed that unlike normal, when shown a photo of a face this little girl's eye contact roamed all over the place, instead of concentrating round the eyes and nose. because she is so young, they've been trialling retraining and she is now doing a lot better at actually looking at the part of the face she needs to, to trigger face recognition.
So, for those of you with a Pervasive Developmental Disorder (PDD) child (or suspected Pervasive Developmental Disorder (PDD)) or if you just have your suspicions, look up face recognition or face blindness and see what information you can find.
The TV show I was watching was on ABC TV's "Catalyst" show, tonight (19 July 2007). ABC in Australia is our national TV free-to-air broadcast channel, nationwide. Commercial-free, apart from self-promotion between programs.
http://www.abc.net.au/tv/guide/netw/200707/programs/SC0602H023D19072007T200000.htm
Interesting, no?
Marg