The Sounds of Their Voices
October 29, 2008 by Kristina Chew, PhD
Filed under Health
Phonagnosia is the inability to recognize voices, yesterday’s Science Daily reports. A case study published in Neuropsychologia reports on “KH,” who is
……unable to recognise people by their voice, including her own daughter whom she has great difficulty identifying over the phone. The woman, known as KH, avoids answering the phone where possible, and for many years has only answered ‘booked calls’. KH books calls with friends or co-workers, so she knows who to expect when the telephone rings at a certain time. In the 1980s, KH had a job in which she introduced herself with a different form of her first name so she would know that it was someone related to her job when they called and asked for her using that name.
Charlie doesn’t say so much using words so it’s not so easy to know what he’s thinking and there’s a tendency to assume that his limited speech means his understanding of what others say is equally limited. He always turns his head or looks up or hums in a different tone when he hears the sound of Jim’s or my voice and certain voices (high-pitched and sounding like LaaLaa, the yellow Teletubby) seem to grate on him.
Jim reminded me that Charlie’s own voice will be changing sooner than soon—so we’ll be having to adapt to the sound of a new voice.
“In the 1980s, KH had a job in which she introduced herself with a different form of her first name so she would know that it was someone related to her job when they called and asked for her using that name.”
This works for faceblindness too and explains why some people call me “jypsy” (to my face & online), some call me “janet” and others still call me “jj”.
Back in my sordid past , I had to speak with places which were equipped with NBSV phones. The NBSV stands for Narrow Band Secure Voice.
Everyone sounded the same. If person A fetched person B to the phone, person B sounded just like person A, so much so that one one at first didn’t want to believe that it was indeed person B and not person A pretending to be B.
I think I have the opposite, I am good at recognising voices (rather perhaps like Henry Fieldings blind brother and bow street runner who could recognise the underworld of London by there voices alone)
I suppose it has developed as a compensation for prosopagnosia, in that I rely on the voice for recognition and often wait till someone speaks to be sure of who they are.
I had severe phone anxiety for sort of the opposite reason, people don’t recognize my voice on the phone. I’ve been mistaken for my mom, and told things I didn’t want to hear. I used to only answer calls I expected, until we got caller id.
I get mistaken for my mom when I pick up the phone at my parents’ house…..