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Throughout my mid-20s, I spotted my elderly relative through the window of a coffee shop. I felt astonished – she had passed away the previous year. I gazed for a brief period, then reminded myself it couldn't be her.

I'd had similar experiences all through my life. Occasionally, I "recognized" someone I didn't know. At times I could promptly identify who the stranger resembled – for instance my grandma. On other occasions, a visage simply had a indistinct knowingness I couldn't identify.

Exploring the Range of Facial Recognition Experiences

In recent times, I became curious if others have these unusual experiences. When I inquired my companions, one commented she regularly sees people in random places who look familiar. Others occasionally misidentify a unfamiliar individual or public figure for someone they know in real life. But some mentioned nothing of the kind – they could effortlessly distinguish people they'd met and people they hadn't.

I felt fascinated by this range of responses. Was it just desire that made me see my grandmother that day – or some kind of cognitive error? Scientific investigation has found we spend about approximately 900 seconds of every hour looking at faces – do we just err sometimes? I was beginning to realize that we can all see the same face but not perceive the same thing.

Grasping the Continuum of Face Identification Skills

Researchers have designed many tests to measure the ability to remember faces. There exists a extensive variety: at one end are exceptional facial identifiers, who recall faces they have seen only for a short time or a considerable time past; at the other are people with facial agnosia, who often find it challenging to identify family, dear acquaintances and even themselves.

Some evaluations also measure how good someone is at recognizing if they have not seen a face before. This is where I suspect I fall short. But researchers "haven't extensively researched this" as much as they've looked at the capacity to recall a face, according to brain researchers. It does seem that the two skills use distinct brain mechanisms; for example, there is indication that exceptional facial identifiers and those with facial agnosia do about as well as each other at discerning new faces, despite their vastly dissimilar abilities to recall old faces.

Undergoing Face Identification Evaluations

I felt curious whether these assessments would shed some light on why strangers look familiar. Was I someone who constantly recalls a face? I often remember people more than they recall me, and feel let down – a feeling that researchers say is typical for exceptional facial identifiers. But maybe I excessively identify faces – to the extent that even some new faces look recognizable.

I received several face identification tests. I completed them, feeling stumped at times. In one, called the memory for faces evaluation, I had to look at monochrome photos of a face from different viewpoints, then find it in arrays. During another test that told me to pick out celebrities from a mix of photos, many of the faces felt at least known, but I couldn't quite place them – similar to my everyday experience.

I felt less than confident about my performance. But after analysis of my results, I had accurately recognized 96% of the famous person faces. The determination was that I qualified as a "almost superior face rememberer".

Understanding Incorrect Identification Rates

I also performed well in the previously seen/unfamiliar faces task, which was described as particularly good for assessing someone's recall for faces. The participant looks at a collection of 60 monochrome photos, each of a distinct face. Then they review a sequence of 120 comparable photos – the initial collection plus 60 unfamiliar countenances – and identify which were in the original collection. The superior face rememberer benchmark is roughly 80%; I recalled 78% of the faces I'd seen. On the other end of the spectrum, people with facial agnosia accurately identify an average of 57%.

I felt content with my result, but also surprised. I recalled many of the familiar visages, but seldom misidentified a unknown visage for one that I'd seen before. My result on this indicator, called the incorrect identification frequency, was 18%. Normal recognizers, superior face rememberers and those with facial agnosia all have a false alarm rate of about 30% on average. So why was I mistaking a unknown person's face for my grandma's?

Investigating Plausible Causes

It was suggested that I likely possessed some exceptional facial identifier abilities. Everyone has a catalogue of the faces we know in our recollection, but superior face rememberers – and possibly near-exceptional individuals like me – have a fairly substantial and detailed catalogue. We're also probably to individuate faces – that is, assign qualities to each face, such as amiability or discourtesy. Scientific investigation suggests that the second aspect helps people to develop and retain faces to permanent recall. While differentiating may help me remember 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 "an engaged facial observer", meaning I pay a significant focus to faces. Others may have more incorrect identification moments, thinking they know someone they don't know. But because I tend to look closely at faces, I am disposed to notice the unfamiliar individual who resembles my grandmother. Indeed, one friend who said she doesn't make person recognition mistakes confessed she doesn't really look at the people around her.

Researching Hyperfamiliarity for Faces

These tests helped me understand where I positioned on the range. But I wanted to understand more about what is happening in the brain when we "identify" unknown people. Investigating further, I read about a disorder called hyperfamiliarity for faces (HFF), in which unrecognized faces appear recognizable. On the surface, this sounded like it could pertain to me. But the few of documented instances all occurred after a medical episode such as a seizure or cerebral accident, unlike the idiosyncrasy that I've been observing my whole mature years.

Through scientific platforms, experts have heard from about 24,000 face-blind individuals, as well as people with all kinds of face identification problems, including perceptual alterations, like when faces appear to be dissolving. Researchers study many of these people, using methods like the known/unknown countenances task and the memory for faces evaluation.

Experts have heard from only a few of people with possible HFF in extended periods of study.

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

{Understanding