The Prodigy's Cousin
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College-level musicians: Ruthsatz et al., “Becoming an Expert in the Musical Domain.” This trend held when just the high school band members were considered: the higher the students’ music achievement, the higher their IQ, domain-specific skills, and practice time. The same was true at the college level, although for these students only the relationship between practice time and achievement was statistically significant.
Following the lead: Thomas R. Insel and Bruce N. Cuthbert, “Brain Disorders? Precisely,” Science, May 1, 2015.
Chapter 1: A Warehouse of a Mind
She used to encounter it a lot: The events in this chapter described by Lucie come from telephone interviews conducted on Sept. 4 and 12 and Oct. 12, 2014, July 12, 2015, and Oct. 20, 2015 (with occasional input from Mike); and e-mail. In addition, Lucie provided videos, photographs, and a written summary of Alex’s and William’s development dating from 2012.
He consumed everything: The “warehouse” description of William’s mind comes from a multi-session psycho-educational assessment, Dec. 5, 2012, Dec. 13, 2012, and Jan. 22, 2013.
Within months, Lucie sensed: The details of Alex’s development come from Lucie, as well as educational and medical reports, including his autism diagnosis, Nov. 22, 2005; his assessment for a preschool autism program, Feb. 23 and March 23, 2006; a psychological assessment, Jan. 22, 2009; a psycho-educational assessment, Jan. 6 and 20, 2010; and a psycho-educational assessment, March 19–21, 2013.
Two months later, Alex was diagnosed with autism: Autism diagnosis, Nov. 22, 2005.
His diagnosis was stripped away: Psychological assessment, Jan. 22, 2009.
William wasn’t as serious: The details of William’s development come from Lucie, as well as a telephone interview with Kathy (William’s piano teacher) conducted on Oct. 10, 2014; a telephone interview with Josh (William’s math teacher) conducted on Oct. 14, 2014; educational and medical reports, including his autism diagnosis, Nov. 21, 2007; an assessment for eligibility to participate in autism intervention, April 21, 2008; a psycho-educational assessment, March 6, April 3 and 17, 2010; a medical assessment, July 29, 2011; and a psycho-educational assessment, Dec. 5, 2012, Dec. 13, 2012, and Jan. 22, 2013.
The doctor diagnosed William: Autism diagnosis, Nov. 21, 2007.
He echoed the words: The information about William’s echolalia is from his 2008 eligibility assessment for an autism intervention program. Lucie remembers that William’s speech was delayed and that even when he did begin talking, he didn’t say much (he “certainly didn’t have the gift of gab,” as Lucie put it). She doesn’t recall his echolalia, but at the time she was still putting a lot of blood, sweat, and tears into helping Alex, so she says it’s possible that some things fell off the radar.
On a standardized test: Psycho-educational assessment, March 6, April 3 and 17, 2010.
He began taking: Medical assessment, July 29, 2011.
“Yes,” William piped up: Lucie, unlike William, doesn’t have perfect recall for atlas page numbers. She’s not 100 percent certain that the actual pages he recited were 34 and 35.
Chapter 2: What Is a Prodigy?
As articulated by Feldman: David Feldman, “The Mysterious Case of Extreme Giftedness,” in The Gifted and the Talented: Their Education and Development, ed. Harry Passow (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1979), 335–51, reprinted by the Davidson Institute for Talent Development. In this article, the standard for prodigiousness is “each child performs in his chosen field at the level of an adult professional before the age of ten.” The “demanding field” aspect of the definition followed soon after. See David Feldman and Lynn T. Goldsmith, Nature’s Gambit (New York: Basic Books, 1986).
When he was a young assistant professor: For an overview of Feldman’s thinking regarding Piaget, see David Feldman, Beyond Universals in Cognitive Development (Norwood, N.J.: Ablex, 1980); and Feldman, “Mysterious Case of Extreme Giftedness.”
“So, I thought, okay”: David Feldman, interview, Feb. 21, 2014.
“I know it when I see it”: This language was famously used in associate justice Potter Stewart’s concurring opinion in Jacobellis v. Ohio, 378 U.S. 184 (1964), in reference to the difficulty of determining what constitutes hard-core pornography.
In one of the earliest: There was an earlier case study of a prodigy, but it has never been translated into English. See Alfred Binet, “La psychologie artistique de Tade Styka,” L’année psychologique 15 (1908): 316–56. N. S. Leites, a Russian researcher, studied child prodigies as well, but these papers are also unavailable in English. Leites briefly references this work in an English-language article, “The Relationship Between the Developmental and the Individual in a Schoolchild’s Aptitudes,” Soviet Psychology 24, no. 2 (1985): 28–45. It is also described in Larisa V. Shavinina, “The Psychological Essence of the Child Prodigy Phenomenon: Sensitive Periods and Cognitive Experience,” Gifted Child Quarterly 43, no. 1 (1999): 25–38.
Erwin was exceptionally pale: G. Révész, The Psychology of a Musical Prodigy (1925; reprint, London: Routledge, 1999); Kevin Bazzana, Lost Genius: The Story of a Forgotten Musical Maverick (Toronto: McClelland & Stewart, 2007).
While he was still a child: Erwin’s later years, unfortunately, weren’t so rosy. For more information on his later life, see Bazzana, Lost Genius.
Révész viewed Erwin: Révész considered whether Erwin was an “infant prodigy” or a “precocious child,” but he ultimately rejected both possibilities. Infant prodigies’ performances, he wrote, lacked personal inspiration, and their compositions tended to be monotonous, a far cry from Erwin’s highly creative, emotional pieces. Nor was Erwin more broadly precocious. Precocious children were advanced in every way, Révész thought, while Erwin was adultlike only in those activities connected with his music.
The next notable contribution: Franziska Baumgarten, Wunderkinder: Psychologische Untersuchungen (Leipzig: Johann Ambrosius Barth, 1930). There is no formal translation of Baumgarten’s book. David Feldman very generously shared an unofficial translation created by a former graduate student in the Tufts German department, circa the late 1970s.
Hollingworth’s journey with these children: Details of Hollingworth’s initial encounter with Edward come from Charlotte G. Garrison, Agnes Burke, and Leta S. Hollingworth, “The Psychology of a Prodigious Child,” Journal of Applied Psychology 1, no. 2 (1917): 101–10; Leta S. Hollingworth, Charlotte G. Garrison, and Agnes Burke, “Subsequent History of E——: Five Years After the Initial Report,” Journal of Applied Psychology 6, no. 2 (1922): 205–10; Leta S. Hollingworth, Children Above 180 IQ (Yonkers-on-Hudson, N.Y.: World Book, 1942).
“subnormal intelligence”: Alfred Binet and Th. Simon, The Development of Intelligence in Children (the Binet-Simon Scale), trans. Elizabeth S. Kite (Baltimore: Williams & Wilkins, 1916).
But over time, the test: Kirk A. Becker, “History of the Stanford-Binet Intelligence Scales: Content and Psychometrics,” Stanford-Binet Intelligence Scales, Fifth Edition, Assessment Service Bulletin No. 1 (2003), http://www.assess.nelson.com/pdf/sb5-asb1.pdf; Deborah L. Ruf, “Use of the SB5 in the Assessment of High Abilities,” Stanford-Binet Intelligence Scales, Fifth Edition, Assessment Service Bulletin No. 3, http://www.assess.nelson.com/pdf/sb5-asb3.pdf.
In the modern version: Ruf, “Use of the SB5 in the Assessment of High Abilities.”
But the version that Hollingworth used: Lewis Madison Terman, The Measurement of Intelligence (Cambridge, Mass.: Riverside Press, 1916); Ruf, “Use of the SB5 in the Assessment of High Abilities.”
Edward’s background: Garrison, Burke, and Hollingworth, “Psychology of a Prodigious Child”; Hollingworth, Garrison, and Burke, “Subsequent History of E——”; Hollingworth, Children Above 180 IQ.
“nearly useless to look for these children”: Hollingworth, Children Above 180 IQ, xiii.
Hollingworth described Edward: Garrison, Burke, and
Hollingworth, “Psychology of a Prodigious Child,” 105; Hollingworth, Children Above 180 IQ, 142.
she merely meant: Hollingworth, Children Above 180 IQ, 153.
he decided to include: Feldman, “Mysterious Case of Extreme Giftedness.”
Feldman found three children: These children were later described in Feldman and Goldsmith, Nature’s Gambit.
He gave them each: Feldman, “Mysterious Case of Extreme Giftedness”; Feldman, Beyond Universals in Cognitive Development.
a more rigorous scientific debate: For a good description of the debate around this definition, see David Feldman and Martha J. Morelock, “Prodigies and Savants,” in The Cambridge Handbook of Intelligence, ed. Robert J. Sternberg and Scott Barry Kaufman (Cambridge, U.K.: Cambridge University Press, 2011), 210–34.
“I said it many times”: Feldman, interview, Feb. 21, 2014.
three additional children: Feldman and Goldsmith, Nature’s Gambit.
“any theory worth its salt”: Ibid., 109.
The difficulty of using: Martha J. Morelock, “The Profoundly Gifted Child in Family Context” (Ph.D. diss., Tufts University, 1995).
He went on to earn: Amy Burkdoll, “Latest Accomplishment: 14-Year-Old Genius Gets His Master’s Degree,” Tuscaloosa News, Aug. 8, 1998; Erica Goode, “The Uneasy Fit of the Precocious and the Average,” New York Times, March 12, 2002; Brian Dakss, “$1M to Child Prodigy in AOL’s ‘Gold Rush,’” CBS News, Nov. 10, 2006.
“I think it had some value”: Feldman, interview, Feb. 21, 2014.
Along the way, she wrote up her work: Joanne Ruthsatz and Douglas K. Detterman, “An Extraordinary Memory: The Case Study of a Musical Prodigy,” Intelligence 31, no. 6 (2003): 509–18.
“rage to master”: Ellen Winner, “The Rage to Master: The Decisive Role of Talent in the Visual Arts,” in The Road to Excellence: The Acquisition of Expert Performance in the Arts and Sciences, Sports, and Games, ed. K. Anders Ericsson (Mahwah, N.J.: Lawrence Erlbaum Associates, 1996), 271–301.
Autism, like prodigy: The CDC provides an overview of autism screening and diagnosis at http://www.cdc.gov/ncbddd/autism/screening.html. To read about a recent interesting effort to identify an autism biomarker, see Tiziano Pramparo et al., “Prediction of Autism by Translation and Immune/Inflammation Coexpressed Genes in Toddlers from Pediatric Community Practices,” JAMA Psychiatry 72, no. 4 (2015): 386–94.
Kanner was a psychiatrist: For information on the history of autism, see Adam Feinstein, A History of Autism: Conversations with the Pioneers (Malden, Mass.: Wiley-Blackwell, 2010), and Steve Silberman, Neurotribes: The Legacy of Autism and the Future of Neurodiversity (New York: Avery, 2015).
In 1938, Kanner met Donald T.: Leo Kanner, “Autistic Disturbances of Affective Contact,” Nervous Child 2 (1943): 217–50.
“extreme autistic aloneness”: Ibid., 242.
Such children were often labeled: For discussion of former labels for autistic children, see ibid.; Gerald D. Fischbach, “Leo Kanner’s 1943 Paper on Autism,” Simons Foundation Autism Research Initiative (2007); Roy Richard Grinker, Unstrange Minds: Remapping the World of Autism (New York: Basic Books, 2007).
He published a paper: Kanner, “Autistic Disturbances of Affective Contact.” Kanner used the term “early infantile autism” in “Early Infantile Autism,” Journal of Pediatrics 25, no. 3 (1944): 211–17.
at a children’s clinic in Vienna: Adam Feinstein, History of Autism; Uta Frith, “Asperger and His Syndrome,” in Autism and Asperger Syndrome, ed. Uta Frith (Cambridge, U.K.: Cambridge University Press, 1991), 1–36.
“highly original genius”: Hans Asperger, “‘Autistic Psychopathy’ in Childhood,” in Frith, Autism and Asperger Syndrome, 74.
He began using the term: Feinstein, History of Autism.
He called it autistic psychopathy: There is some wiggle room in this translation. As noted in Frith, Autism and Asperger Syndrome, it could also have been translated as “autistic personality disorder” or “autism.”
This view is shifting: Silberman, Neurotribes.
“fundamental disorder”: Kanner, “Autistic Disturbances of Affective Contact,” 242 (italics removed).
“the shutting-off of relations”: Asperger, “‘Autistic Psychopathy’ in Childhood,” 39.
In the early autism studies: For a discussion of the fluctuation in autism criteria in the early studies, see Michael Rutter, “Diagnosis and Definition of Childhood Autism,” Journal of Autism and Childhood Schizophrenia 8, no. 2 (1978): 139–61. Lorna Wing and Judith Gould’s classic 1979 paper also has an excellent overview of the difficulty researchers had distinguishing those who had autism from those who did not, as well as trying to sort out whether there are different types of autism. See “Severe Impairments of Social Interaction and Associated Abnormalities in Children: Epidemiology and Classification,” Journal of Autism and Developmental Disorders 9, no. 1 (1979): 11–29.
“a pseudodiagnostic wastebasket”: Leo Kanner, foreword to Infantile Autism: The Syndrome and Its Implications for a Neural Theory of Behaviour, by Bernard Rimland (London: Methuen, 1965), v.
autism has gone from a symptom: Autism (specifically, “infantile autism”) was first listed separately from childhood schizophrenia in the DSM-III, published in 1980.
the diagnostic criteria have shifted: There’s a good overview of research on this issue (and a finding that using the diagnostic criteria in DSM-IV-TR instead of the criteria in DSM-III increased the number of people who qualified as autistic) in Judith S. Miller et al., “Autism Spectrum Disorder Reclassified: A Second Look at the 1980s Utah/UCLA Autism Epidemiologic Study,” Journal of Autism and Developmental Disorders 43, no. 1 (2013): 200–210.
When work began on the most recent edition of the DSM: David J. Kupfer, Michael B. First, and Darrell A. Regier, eds., A Research Agenda for DSM-V (Washington, D.C.: American Psychiatric Association, 2002).
this change was made: “Autism Spectrum Disorder,” DSM-5 Autism Spectrum Disorder Fact Sheet (American Psychiatric Association, 2013).
“Behaviour, however reliably”: Uta Frith, “Why We Need Cognitive Explanations of Autism,” Quarterly Journal of Experimental Psychology 65, no. 11 (2012): 2073–92.
In 2001, he and his colleagues: Simon Baron-Cohen et al., “The Autism-Spectrum Quotient (AQ): Evidence from Asperger Syndrome/High-Functioning Autism, Males and Females, Scientists and Mathematicians,” Journal of Autism and Developmental Disorders 31, no. 1 (2001): 5–17.
Autists’ family members: See, for example, Jennifer Gerdts and Raphael Bernier, “The Broader Autism Phenotype and Its Implications on the Etiology and Treatment of Autism Spectrum Disorders,” Autism Research and Treatment 17 (2011); and A. Pickles et al., “Variable Expression of the Autism Broader Phenotype: Findings from Extended Pedigrees,” Journal of Child Psychology and Psychiatry 41, no. 4 (2000): 491–502.
AQ results: Joanne Ruthsatz, “Preliminary Evidence: Expanding the Autistic Spectrum to Include Child Prodigies,” in “Behavior Genetics Association 37th Annual Meeting Abstracts,” Behavior Genetics 37, no. 6 (2007): 734–809.
Chapter 3: The Tiniest Chef
Fellow diners around Manhattan: The events in this chapter described by Greg Grossman come from a telephone interview conducted on July 12, 2015. The events in this chapter described by Terre Grossman come from telephone interviews conducted on July 19, 2013, May 1 and June 19, 2014, and Sept. 7, 2015; and e-mail. In addition, Terre provided a written summary of Greg’s development, a letter she wrote to one of Greg’s teachers, essays Greg wrote, menus Greg prepared, documents from Greg’s early business ventures, and photographs.
Greg soon began experimenting: Greg Grossman, “Cooking Autobiography” (writing lab assignment), 2007.
Around the time Greg was nine: Ibid.
That year, he prepared the meal: There is some disagreement over whether this first meal was p
an-seared scallops or salmon with cucumbers and turnips. The pan-seared scallops descriptions can be found in ibid., and Michelle Trauring, “Greg Grossman: Chef Prodigy,” East Hampton Press and Southampton Press, Jan. 22, 2013.
Around the time he was twelve: Greg Grossman, “Introductory Essay” (prepared for Literature and the Law course), 2012; Annie Karni, “A Touch of Classes,” New York Post, Dec. 19, 2010; Trauring, “Greg Grossman: Chef Prodigy.” Some news stories have reported that Greg was even younger than twelve when he began working at the East Hampton restaurant.
The Ross School Café: Ross School Café menu, http://www.ross.org/menu?rc=0.
When Greg was in fifth grade: Greg Grossman, telephone interview, July 12, 2015; Greg Grossman, “Introductory Essay.”
One day in June: Information relating to Greg’s first catering job comes from a menu he prepared for the event; Barbara Hoffman, “Small Fry,” New York Post, Aug. 27, 2008; and Greg Grossman, “Introductory Essay.”
For the rest of the summer: Hoffman, “Small Fry”; Barry Gordin, “Gordin’s View,” Dan’s Papers, Aug. 29, 2008.
At the James Beard Foundation’s: “Teen Chef Greg Grossman, 13, Demo’s Paco Jet at Javit’s International Restaurant Show,” YouTube video, 1:19, posted by “acookstale,” Nov. 3, 2012; “Aspiring Young Chef, a Ross Student, Caters NYC Gala,” Hamptons.com, May 8, 2009; “Greg Grossman, Alinea’s 13-Year-Old Sous Chef,” Grub Street, May 18, 2009; “Culinaria Group,” Modern Arts of the Culinary World, March 11, 2009.
“coming out party”: Andrew Greiner, “Culinary Superstar at Age 13,” NBCNewYork.com, May 18, 2009.
Greg demonstrated how to whip up: Christopher Borrelli, “Greg Grossman: Celebrity Chef Is Just 13,” Chicago Tribune, May 18, 2009; lobster recipe, 2009 National Restaurant Association demo, May 2009; “Culinaria Group”; “East End’s Kiddie Chef Signs Reality-TV Deal,” Grub Street, June 8, 2009; Maxine Shen, “Lil’ Food Dude,” New York Post, June 9, 2009.