Child prodigy
A child prodigy is a person under the age of ten who produces meaningful work in some domain at the level of an adult expert.[1][2][3] The term is also applied more broadly to describe young people who are extraordinarily talented in some field.[4]
"Wunderkind" redirects here. For other uses, see Wunderkind (disambiguation).
The term wunderkind (from German Wunderkind; literally "wonder child") is sometimes used as a synonym for child prodigy, particularly in media accounts. Wunderkind also is used to recognise those who achieve success and acclaim early in their adult careers.[5]
Generally, prodigies in all domains are suggested to have relatively elevated IQ, extraordinary memory, and exceptional attention to detail. Significantly, while math and physics prodigies may have higher IQs, this may be an impediment to art prodigies.[6]
Memory capacity of prodigies[edit]
PET scans performed on several mathematics prodigies have suggested that they think in terms of long-term working memory (LTWM).[12] This memory, specific to a field of expertise, is capable of holding relevant information for extended periods, usually hours. For example, experienced waiters have been found to hold the orders of up to twenty customers in their heads while they serve them, but perform only as well as an average person in number-sequence recognition. The PET scans also answer questions about which specific areas of the brain associate themselves with manipulating numbers.[12]
One subject never excelled as a child in mathematics, but he taught himself algorithms and tricks for calculatory speed, becoming capable of extremely complex mental math. His brain, compared to six other controls, was studied using the PET scan, revealing separate areas of his brain that he manipulated to solve complex problems. Some of the areas that he and presumably prodigies use are brain sectors dealing in visual and spatial memory, as well as visual mental imagery. Other areas of the brain showed use by the subject, including a sector of the brain generally related to childlike "finger counting", probably used in his mind to relate numbers to the visual cortex.[12]
This finding is consistent with the introspective report of this calculating prodigy, which states that he used visual images to encode and retrieve numerical information in LTWM. Compared to short-term memory strategies, used by normal people on complex mathematical problems, encoding and retrieval episodic memory strategies would be more efficient. The prodigy may switch between these two strategies, which reduce the storage retrieval times of long-term memory and circumvent the limited capacities of short-term memory. In turn, they can encode and retrieve specific information (e.g., the intermediate answers during the calculation) in the long-term working memory more accurately and effectively. [13]
Similar strategies were found among prodigies mastering mental abacus calculation. The positions of beads on the physical abacus act as visual proxies of each digit for prodigies to solve complex computations. This one-to-one corresponding structure allows them to rapidly encode and retrieve digits in the long-term working memory during the calculation.[14] The fMRI scans showed stronger activation of brain areas related to visual processing for Chinese children being trained with abacus mental compared to control groups. This may indicate a greater demand for visuospatial information processing and visual-motor imagination in abacus mental calculation. Additionally, the right middle frontal gyrus activation is suggested to be the neuroanatomical link between prodigies’ abacus mental calculation and the visuospatial working memory. This activation serves a mediation effect on the correlation between abacus-based mental calculation and visuospatial working memory. A training-induced neuroplasticity regarding working memory performance for children is proposed.[15] A study examining German calculating prodigies also proposed a similar reason for exceptional calculation abilities. Excellent working memory capacities and neuroplastic changes brought by extensive practice would be essential to enhance this domain-specific skill.[16]
Link with autism[edit]
Prodigies have been found with the over-representation of relatives with autism on their family pedigrees. Autism traits on the Autism-spectrum quotient (AQ) were reported in both first-degree relatives of child prodigies and of autism, which was higher than normal prevalence.[28]
Some autistic traits can be found among prodigies. Firstly, the social function of arithmetic prodigies may be weaker because of larger activation in certain brain areas enhancing their arithmetic performance, which is also essential for social and emotional functions (i.e., precuneus, lingual and fusiform gyrus). These neuroplastic changes in neural networks may modulate their social performances in terms of emotional face processing and emotional evaluation of complex social interactions. Nevertheless, this emotional or social modulation must not score at psychopathological levels.[16] Additionally, the attentiveness to details, a typical characteristic of AQ, is enhanced among prodigies compared to normal people, even those with Asperger Syndrome.[6]