Do I Know You? (A Hidden Brain-Revisionist History special on facial recognition)

This is Hidden Brain, I'm Shankar Vedanta. If you're like me, you know this feeling. Maybe you're at a party or you're walking down the street and suddenly, out of a sea of passing faces, one of them lights up looking right at you. This person starts waving, says hello. This person is glad to see you.

And you? You have no idea who you're looking at. Recognizing faces is a crucial skill, but although your mind is amazing at identifying your boyfriend or your child in a crowd, there are important limits to this ability. Some of us, like me, are extremely bad at it. Some of us are terrific.

Today, We bring you a classic hidden brain episode about people on opposite ends of the facial recognition spectrum. We'll also explore how our ability to recognize faces has broad implications in our lives. And then, in the second part of today's show, we're going to bring you another look at facial recognition from the Revisionist History podcast. If you're unfamiliar with the show, Revisionist History is best-selling author Malcolm Gladwell's podcast about things overlooked and misunderstood.

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