Des anyone else have trouble recognizing faces?

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Even since I've been a little girl I've trouble recognizing people especially if someone changed their hair or their outfit. I remember being like 7 or 8 and I was going to a sleep over and we had to pick my friend up from school and she approached me I didn't recognize her at all she was wearing her school uniform and had her hair different.

I sometimes get people at work with confused I always have to stare at their faces longer than I should because my brain cant piece together if this is person A or person B

Does anyone else get what I mean, maybe it's because I dont make a lot of eye contact idk

There is a user on here who has a lot of trouble with face-blindness but I'll not "out" him now. Yes, you are not experiencing a unique thing. It happens to a lot of us.

I for one have a hard time sometimes spotting subtle changes in a person's face or makeup.

The condition of having face blindness (prosopagnosia) is somewhat common with Aspies.

Face blindness isn’t always a standard symptom of autism, but it seems to be more common in those with autism than in the general population. It’s theorized that face blindness may be part of what sometimes impairs the social development of people with autism.

The Benton Facial Recognition Test (BFRT) and Warrington Recognition Memory of Faces (RMF) are two tests that physicians may use to evaluate potential face blindness.

I am faceblind. Many times someone will approach me and begin a conversation. I just try and hold my end of the conversation and then when they left, I ask my wife "Who was that?"

That's intresting. Im glad I'm not going crazy haha
Just something I'm staring to notice now that I'm older.

Thanks for reply

Yes. I have faceblindness and so does my mother.

Once I was walking to the bank and I turned the corner to walk down the street where the bank was at the other end. I saw a lady and a little boy. I thought I had seen her before somewhere but I just couldn't think where, so I said "Hello" and the lady said "Hello" and we both carried on aalking. The little boy seemed to know mw and he was tugging at his mothers hand. He seemed concerned when his Mum walked on and I carried on walking, and he kept looking back.
I got to the bank and entered the queue. They were long queues in those days. I had been going through my mind the manual way by trying to recall all the people I know to see if I could work out who it was that I'd seen. After a while when I had gone through all the family friends, and my closer relatives, I then turned white when I realized who they are. My mother and my youngest brother! I lived with them!
I then rannout rhe bank and up the street and I think I caught up with them in the next street. As my mother also has faceblindness, it wasn't until I cauhht up with her that she realized that it was me!

Last edited by Mountain Goat on 29 Nov 2019, 8:33 pm, edited 1 time in total.

I have this problem with face blindness. People I supposedly know say hello to me and use my name but I don't know where I know them from.

I have a very strong visual memory, so face blindness has never been an issue for me. Just goes to show the diversity within the autistic community!

Yes. Surprizing that a schoolfriend I know who is the only person who still occasionally visits me about once a year on average out of all the people that I was in school with... Now he is absolutely amazing with recognizing people. He can see someone a mile away and know exactly who it is! And he could do this as a child.
It is only now (We didn't know and I don't think he knew) tat his mother had confided to my mother that he had autism.
All I knew was that for the first couple of years in primary school he kinda bullied me. He was used to playing rough with older brothers. But later we became friends. In secondary school we were split up because I had above average intelligence and he was in the remedials. He was not gifted acedemically, but manual work he was like a machine! He would keep going and going! Even today he is like that, though now we are older he does feel tired if he has had a long day. When younger I don't think he ever got tired!
Is interesting though. I am not sure where he is living these days, but he is the one person out of hundreds I was in school with (850 pupils in secondary school) who calls in. I may not see him for a couple of years, and then I see him two or three times a year.
I really appreciate that he makes the effort.

I have it too. Up until a couple of months I didn’t know it was a thing. I thought I was just very odd...

Only with a very small number of people. I'm usually really good with faces and terrible with names.

I think I have a problem though, as though I don't get faceblindness with everyone as if I expect them to be where I see them it is ok. Also some people have distinct features where I can remember, so I don't get faceblindness with them. But the problem is with faceblindness, is that I really don't know when I do get it because I often only really know if someone has said something to me. I have lost many people from my life, and I am guessing it is because I have ignored them because I didn't know that they were there or who they were, and they have been upset with me. Therefore I have lost so many people from my life. I seem to only be able to stay in touch with current people I know. Past people that once knew me have entirely vanished from my memory and therefore I have lost them.
Oh. And names. I have a problem. I also have a problem recalling names as well. In my mind, not only habe peoples faces dissapeared so I can't remember who they are if I saw them, their names have dissapeared as well!
When people come up to me who I am puzzled who they are, I try to keep them talking as long as I can so I can get some sort of clue as to who they are! I have had entire conversations with people and they have walked away happy, and I have not had a clue who they were to this day. Yet they knew me somehow, and this was with a 20 minute or more conversation where once they start talking for a few minutes and seemed to know me well, it would be ever so embarissing if after about five to ten minutes I ask "Who are you?"
And put name blindness on top of that as well!

Two things I have to use to go on.
1. Peoples voices.
2. Where I normally expect to see them.

If it wasn't for that, I would likely have no friends, but somehow, my best friend who lives locally I do recognise his face as he is relatively short, normally dresses scruffy and is balled with a long nose! He is unique and has an easily recognizable voice.

Recognizing faces has never been an issue, but remembering the name that goes along with the face? Nope!

I sometimes find it quite hard to recognise faces but my main thing is remembering them accurately. How someone looks in my head and irl can be very different and honestly confusing.

Women can be more confusing as they change their hairstyles and colour of their hair. I usually remember them by their hair and voice.

Sometimes I forget what I look like so I have to stare at myself in the mirror to remember how I look.
Sometimes how I think I look is different from how I actually look, and I can see myself in the mirror, and I have to look again, as I think "Oh. Do I look like that?" It can take me by surprize!

Sometimes I may not recognize myself in old photographs unless I remember where I was in the photo.

You're definitely not alone on that one. I have a lot of trouble recognizing faces - it takes me a long time to be able to recognize people, and then if they change anything about their look, or if I see them somewhere other than where I'm expecting to see them, then I may not recognize them.