NTs Are Weird

Around a decade ago, prosopagnosia was an extremely rare diagnosis. Less than a few dozen people in the entire world were known to have this condition. It was thought to be very unusual, and extremely rare.

What is prosopagnosia? It’s the inability to recognize people by their face. Most people instinctively can recognize others by someone’s face. Someone with prosopagnosia cannot do this, and may not recognize their own children or parents if they encounter them when they aren’t expected to encounter them (most people with prosopagnosia use other means to recognize people, means that don’t work nearly as well, so they have particular problems with out-of-context recognition).

Recently, new research has challenged the old estimates of prevalence, putting the rate of prosopagnosia at 2% of the general population. That’s right – we went from something that was exceedingly rare to 2% of the population in about ten years!

Why this “increase?” It’s simple. Ten years ago few knew of “prosopagnosia”, and even fewer identified themselves as having an actual neurological condition that caused them to differ from most other people. It’s not that there are more face blind people today – there aren’t. It’s that 50 year olds are discovering that there is a name for what they probably thought was a personal failing, and that it truly isn’t a personal failing – it’s something that cannot be helped, and they really do have a harder time than others!

The good news is that it’s much more likely someone will find out about this condition today, and they can do things to make life easier for themselves (See a page I write about coping with face blindness). That’s a really good thing.

It’s sort of like all the adults I know who, as adults, discover that they are autistic. Somehow they went through life, struggling immensely, without ever knowing that they were struggling compared to everyone else. They just thought everyone worked harder at life, or somehow managed on their own – and thus it must be a personal failing. Well, it’s not. And, fortunately children today – when people focus on things other than “cure at all cost” – will learn how to live with their autism. They’ll learn that they aren’t morally inferior for having a hard time with life. They’ll learn that there is even joy in acknowledging the fullness of who they are, just as I’ve learned there is joy in telling someone that I won’t recognize them in an hour (it’s joyous not because I don’t recognize them, but because now there is less expectation by others for me to recognize them). This joy is a good thing too.