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Throughout my mid-20s, I observed my grandma through the glass of a coffee house. I felt stunned – she had departed the year before. I stared for a short time, then reminded myself it couldn't be her.

I'd had similar occurrences all through my life. Periodically, I "identified" an individual I didn't know. Occasionally I could quickly identify who the stranger reminded me of – for instance my grandmother. In other instances, a visage simply had a indistinct knowingness I couldn't place.

Exploring the Range of Face Identification Abilities

In recent times, I started wondering if other people have these unusual experiences. When I asked my acquaintances, one mentioned she frequently sees persons in random places who look known. Others sometimes mistake a unknown person or famous person for someone they know in real life. But some mentioned completely different responses – they could readily identify people they'd met and people they hadn't.

I felt curious by this range of responses. Was it just desire that made me see my grandmother that day – or some kind of brain malfunction? Studies has found we spend about a quarter-hour of every hour looking at faces – do we just err sometimes? I was commencing to comprehend that we can all see the same face but not perceive the same thing.

Comprehending the Spectrum of Facial Recognition Abilities

Researchers have created many assessments to quantify the capacity to recognize faces. There exists a wide range: at one side are super-recognizers, who recognize faces they have seen only briefly or a considerable time past; at the other are people with facial agnosia, who often find it challenging to know family, intimate companions and even themselves.

Some tests also assess how proficient someone is at recognizing if they have not seen a face before. This is where I think I fall short. But scientists "haven't thoroughly investigated this" as much as they've looked at the ability to recall a face, according to neuroscience experts. It does seem that the two abilities use separate brain functions; for instance, there is proof that super-recognizers and those with facial agnosia do about as well as each other at identifying new faces, despite their vastly dissimilar abilities to remember old faces.

Taking Face Identification Tests

I felt intrigued whether these assessments would provide insight on why strangers look known. Was I someone who always remembers a face? I often recall people more than they remember me, and feel disheartened – a emotion that experts say is common for exceptional facial identifiers. But maybe I excessively identify faces – to the degree that even some new faces look recognizable.

I obtained several face identification tests. I worked through them, feeling puzzled at times. In one, called the Cambridge Face Memory Test, I had to look at black-and-white photos of a face from different viewpoints, then find it in arrays. During another test that directed me to pick out public figures from a mix of photos, many of the faces felt at least familiar, but I couldn't quite place them – comparable to my everyday experience.

I felt uncertain about my outcome. But after analysis of my results, I had properly distinguished 96% of the public figure faces. The determination was that I qualified as a "borderline super-recognizer".

Understanding False Alarm Frequencies

I also performed well in the known/unknown countenances task, which was described as particularly good for assessing someone's recall for faces. The participant looks at a sequence of 60 black-and-white photos, each of a distinct face. Then they review a string of 120 comparable photos – the initial collection plus 60 unfamiliar countenances – and identify which were in the initial group. The superior face rememberer cutoff is roughly 80%; I recalled 78% of the faces I'd seen. On the other end of the range, people with face blindness properly recognize an average of 57%.

I felt pleased with my score, but also taken aback. I recognized many of the previously seen countenances, but rarely misidentified a unknown visage for one that I'd seen before. My score on this measure, called the mistaken recognition percentage, was 18%. Typical rememberers, super-recognizers and prosopagnosics all have a incorrect identification frequency of about 30% on average. So why was I confusing a unfamiliar individual's face for my elderly relative's?

Investigating Potential Causes

It was theorized that I probably possessed some super-recognizer abilities. Everyone has a catalogue of the faces we know in our recollection, but superior face rememberers – and probably near-exceptional individuals like me – have a relatively large and precise catalogue. We're also likely to individuate faces – that is, assign traits to each face, such as amiability or discourtesy. Studies suggests that the later element helps people to learn and retain faces to permanent recall. While differentiating may help me recall people, it may also deceive me into seeing my elderly relative in a woman who has a analogous presence.

In furthermore, it was thought I might be "a attentive countenance examiner", meaning I pay a significant focus to faces. Others may have more incorrect identification moments, thinking they identify someone they don't know. But because I tend to look attentively at faces, I am prone to notice the unknown person who resembles my grandma. Indeed, one friend who said she doesn't make facial recognition mistakes acknowledged she doesn't really look at the people around her.

Examining Over-familiarity for Faces

These assessments helped me understand where I positioned on the range. But I wanted to understand more about what is happening in the brain when we "recognize" unfamiliar individuals. Examining further, I read about a syndrome called hyperfamiliarity for faces (HFF), in which unknown faces appear known. Initially, this sounded like it could apply to me. But the few of documented instances all took place after a physical event such as a seizure or cerebral accident, unlike the idiosyncrasy that I've been experiencing my whole mature years.

Through investigative websites, experts have heard from about 24,000 prosopagnosics, as well as people with all kinds of face identification problems, including sight abnormalities, like when faces appear to be dissolving. Researchers study many of these people, using tools like the old/new faces task and the memory for faces evaluation.

Experts have heard from only a small number of people with possible HFF in extended periods of research.

"The prevalence is quite low," one expert said of HFF. However, they hypothesized that there may be a continuum, with some people who think every face is recognizable, and others, like me, who only encounter it a several occasions a month.

{Understanding