Anyone else good at learning lists?

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I know most of the train routes (ie all the stations in order on those lines) coming out of London. I used to know the London Underground map off by heart when I was in secondary school (and I still know the vast majority of it). I also can easily learn PI to a few hundred decimal places (I've did it when I was 14). I could easily learn the Periodic Table in order, the element numbers, names and atomic masses if I decided to put the effort into that.

I seem to have a skill for learning lists that don't have patterns.

I know all the 54 stations from London Waterloo to Weymouth, for example.

I learned a train map for one service (which had about seven different routes on it) in 20 minutes; I can learn these lists relatively quickly.

And these maps stay in my head for a very long, if not indefinite time. I still remember Waterloo to Weymouth without a single error without having studied it for a few weeks.

Does anyone else here have a skill in learning lists like these? Ones that cannot be calculated and have to be learned verbatim?

Is this related to my Asperger's? My dad thinks it is.

Hi Steelmaiden

I think it may well be linked to Aspergers. It's not unusual for people on the spectrum to learning lists of details on something they're really into. Do you specifically learn these lists, i.e. do you decide to study them and intentionally commit them to memory? Do you know why you do this? Are you obsessed with memorising or are you obsessed with the subject you are memorising (or both)?

If I chose to do such a thing, I think I could, as I have a good long term memory. I would use memorising techniques. But, it's not something I've ever been inclined to do, unless I needed to, for an exam.

One word: PokeDex.

A good memory is a common cognitive trait on the spectrum. A good memory for random things, eggspecially. Like the random things are sucked as-is into your brain and stay there 4evar, without much conscious effort on your part. It is eggstremely easy to memorize things for many autistic people. Memorizing is the same as seeing or hearing for me. I don't know any memorization techniques. I just use the mental camera or the mental tape recorder in my brain to memorize things that I see or hear. Maybe these are memorization techniques, but much of my memorizing is automatic, without me trying to memorize anything. The things are just there when I recall them. Like music that I hear. I hum or sing music without knowing that I know it. Sometimes, I memorize things on purpose. Like bus schedules if I need to take the bus somewhere, by looking. Or maps if I need to drive somewhere, by looking. Or textbooks if I need to take a test, by looking. This memorizing by looking can be taken to an eggstreme in a verry merry berry few people, like autistic savant Stephen Wiltshire, who can draw a picture of a city after a 20-minute helicopter ride over the city. Most autistic people can't do that, but many autistic people do a moar modest version of that in eberryday life. Even a moar modest version is a great memory compared to most other people, who seem to have difficulty sucking things as-is into their brains, even with conscious effort on their part.

I memorize numbers bester than words too. Strings of random numbers are the easiest things to remember, in my eggsperience. When I was little, my job on shopping trips was to memorize the serial numbers of the products that my parents wanted to compare from store to store for the lowest possible price. I was also responsible for memorizing maps for navigation on family roadtrips. Numbers and pictures seem to be my specialty. These seem to be purrrty common specialties for people on the spectrum, based on what I have read on this forum. Words I remember as part of my looking at a map or a page of a book, but the pictures and numbers, I remember bester than words.

I used to know all the bus routes in my home city. I learned them when I was around 9 and I still remember most of them now.

I absolutely think this is linked with your Asperger's. I have Asperger's as well and I am awesome at memorizing stuff especially when it has anything to do with my special interests. I memorize lists and stuff all the time.

Thanks for the replies everyone.

Numbers are easy for me to remember too, especially as I see patterns in numbers that other people can't.

I am going to use my abilities to my advantage and learn as many (if not all!) of the train maps in England. I already know pretty much all of the Southeast/London ones. As for the London Underground map, I just stare at that for ten minutes a day or so and it sinks in. You could say "how can I get from X to Y" on the London Underground, and I can tell you which lines to take and where to change. A friend asked me how to get to Plaistow from Morden, and I didn't even have to think, I just blurted out "get a Northern Line train via Charing Cross to Embankment, change there for the District Line and get a train to Barking or Upminster. However not all Northern Line trains go via Charing Cross without having to change at Kennington, so it might be easier to get the train via Bank, and change at Bank for the District Line, although Bank is a bigger station than Embankment and requires a lot of walking through tunnels."

I can actually visualise what every single station I've ever visited in my life looks like, in great detail, even if I've only visited it once.

Also the Periodic Table is an example of my subliminal learning: name any symbol and I can tell you the element without hesitation. I never formally learned it, it just sunk in after I was bored in a chemistry lesson and was staring at the Periodic Table on the wall.