# (I never forget a face), the famous Groucho Marx. (But in your case, I'll be excluding.)

Groscho's memory of the faces may be legendary, but in fact is not exceptional. In fact, humans are very good at recognizing the faces they have seen before. There is an evolutionary reason for that.

Not only humans but also many other social animals recognize their colleagues from their faces.

So we have dedicated mechanisms in the brain to process facial features. This makes face recognition relatively quick and accurate. But the challenge is to remember the names of those faces.

# In a recent article, psychologist Lise Abrams and Danielle Davis learned the complex reasons why we forget names. First, look at four ways in which the names of people differ:

Names are arbitrary: regular words constantly refer to the same thing. If I told you (with me an apple in my backpack), you have a good idea of ​​how the apple looks. But if I told you I have a friend named Brad, you do not know anything about him.
The names do not contain synonyms: we all have a word experience (on the tip of the tongue) and we know that there is a specific word we want to use but we can not retrieve it from memory. Fortunately, almost all words have synonyms, and although they may not be what we want , But it will meet the purpose. But the names of people do not have synonyms - there are no alternatives.


Names contain multiple words: in many cultures, it is common for a person to have a certain name, family name, and sometimes additional names. If you're trying to remember the name of the actor who starred in two films in which two planes crash into the water, Tom - Tom just will not do it, you need his full name. (Tom Hanks, Tom Hanks, Castaway and Sully).


Names are low-frequency words: among ordinary words, words that are (on the tip of the tongue) are more common with low-frequency words such as "disseminate" than high-frequency words such as "spread". Even when the components of names are common, such as Tom, Hanks, Brad, and Pitt, their compositions are less common. 

Sometimes even the letters of the names are unfamiliar, making them difficult to remember. For example, who played the lead role in the film (12 Years a Slave) I know you can see his face, but what is his name?
In short, forgetting a person's name is just like forgetting a word. You're sure you know this word or name, or you feel you should know, but you can not just remember it. However, the strategies we use to circumvent memory failures often fail in the case of names.

The case of (word on the tip of the tongue) can be considered a form of production error. We fail to produce the desired word or name. But memory failures can occur on the receiving end as well. In this case, we have a misconception.

We all went through a similar experience. Your colleague told you that Sandra in the accounts had recently been married, at which time you were thinking he was talking about Erika on the payroll. I heard him say (Sandra), but your mind pulled Erika's picture instead. In the end, I realized your mistake and you have to go back and rewrite the memories that you just created. (Or perhaps not aware of the error, and later in the day congratulates Erika).

# Name memory was tested in the lab by giving participants information about a famous person and then asking for their name or what they know about it.
Q: Who is the British actor who represented Harry Potter in the film series?

A: Daniel Radcliffe.

Or we may ask:

Q: How many animals did Moses take on the ship?

A: Two of each kind.


![why-do-we-forget-names-384x253.jpg](https://steemitimages.com/DQmdFGLGeAfwHEJRpFV2t3WRUUyzXJFLjAw78oLQ5JMq7Dm/why-do-we-forget-names-384x253.jpg)