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Misophonia: Scientists Crack Why Eating Sounds Can Make People Angry (bbc.com)
An anonymous reader quotes a report from BBC: Why some people become enraged by sounds such as eating or breathing has been explained by brain scan studies. The condition, misophonia, is far more than simply disliking noises such as nails being scraped down a blackboard. UK scientists have shown some people's brains become hardwired to produce an "excessive" emotional response. Olana developed the condition when she was eight years old. Her trigger sounds include breathing, eating and rustling noises. Scientists, including Olana, at multiple centers in the UK scanned the brains of 20 misophonic people and 22 people without the condition. They were played a range of noises while they were in the MRI machine, including: neutral sounds such as rain; generally unpleasant sounds such as screaming; people's trigger sounds. The results, published in the journal Current Biology, revealed the part of the brain that joins our senses with our emotions -- the anterior insular cortex -- was overly active in misophonia. And it was wired up and connected to other parts of the brain differently in those with misophonia. Dr Sukhbinder Kumar, from Newcastle University, told BBC News: "They are going into overdrive when they hear these sounds, but the activity was specific to the trigger sounds not the other two sounds. The reaction is anger mostly, it's not disgust, the dominating emotion is the anger -- it looks like a normal response, but then it is going into overdrive." There are no treatments, but Olana has developed coping mechanisms such as using ear plugs. It is still not clear how common the disorder is, as there is no clear way of diagnosing it and it was only recently discovered. Ultimately, the researchers hope, understanding the difference in the misophonic brain will lead to new treatments. One idea is that low levels of targeted electricity passed through the skull, which is known to adjust brain function, could help.
This is only a test.
From the article:
"I spent a long time avoiding places like the cinema. I'd have to move carriages seven or eight times on 30-minute train journeys, and I left a job after three months as I spent more time crying and having panic attacks than working."
I get annoyed at eating sounds, but I never imagined it being something that could affect a person's life! Fascinating.
Don't worry, I'm just hungry a bit, I hear you eating and smell you eating and you're not offering me a bite, so I'm going to growl, claw you to death and steal your food, step away and eat it. Then I'll pee on every tree around and find a sex partner or something remotely like it.
Sounds rather like the opposite of ASMR, which produces non-intuitive positive sensations and emotions in response to similar sounds, in susceptible individuals.
~ Whence do you come, slayer of men, or where are you going, conqueror of space?
Fingernails on a chalkboard, screaming/yelling, etc. - most of these sounds don't really upset me. What does tick me off is the sound of gulping/swallowing. I don't make these noises, but too many of you uncultured pigs do, and I've been keeping a list...
Chaos maximizes locally around me.
I get irritated by these noises, but I just tend to think that if I am hearing noises I shouldn't be hearing, because people are capable of breathing and eating quietly in most cases, it's because someone is trying to bug me by monopolizing my attention. Some people are amused simply because they can bug people with no consequences, /shrug.
"...I think the Microsoft hatred is a disease." - Linus Torvalds
Now that they've identified the part of the brain that causes this irrational response, doctors can simply cauterise it so the rest of us can carry on munching, crunching and slurping like normal humans. After all, no-one was going to make allowances for Albert J. Pfister
When they came for the communists, I said "He's next door. Take him away. Goddam commies."
The reason people get angry by someone loudly crunching, slurping, or smacking their lips over food is because those are things you notice when only the loud/rude person is eating (say, in a cubicle next to you), and they are sounds that don't have to happen. The person making those sounds is through troll-like manners deliberately making sure everyone can hear them eating.
If you ran those scans again and made sure that the subjects could hear the plainly obvious distinction between someone eating, and someone clearly trying eat quietly even if not very successfully so ... guaranteed that virtully all of the people that they measured showing angry responses would react very differently.
People who chew and slurp loudly KNOW they are being jerks, and they know that most people will be polite and bear it because it's socially awkward to say to a co-worker or stranger, "Didn't your parents ever tell you to chew with your mouth closed?" So the polite people have to suffer the rude people, and most of the time they have to suffer it every single time the rude person eats - which, in some settings, could be several times a week for years on end. There's nothing wrong with the people who find assholish behavior maddening. Are they supposed to like it? It's another person being deliberately insulting in their evaluation of the fact they're sharing (within ear-shot) space with other people. A neutral, uncaring reaction to that sort of jackassery would be the unusual behavior, not the other way around.
What word is not blocked, macdonalds?
My dad had it, but grew out of it when hit adulthood.
I had it pretty bad as a kid - drove me so mad I would attack my siblings at meal times and occasionally my brother at night time in our shared room. But then it rapidly abated when I hit about 17-18 (though still a minor irritant into my 20's, non-issue now that I am 44. My younger sister was the opposite, fine as a kid, and had it onset as adult - has screwed up her adult life a lot (40 now), earphones are a godsend, older sister has it to a minor degree too.
It's definitely a thing. If it is quiet and I can hear someone eating, I will get seriously mad.
Foot tapping is the worst though. If I can feel the vibrations of someone tapping their foot or shaking their leg through a table, chair, or the floor, I will become enraged. If it's somewhere you have to be quiet, like a classroom or library, it's doubly worse because I can't tell them to stop. It seriously makes me want to beat the shit out of them for being so irritating. But I don't because they're probably autistic or something and it's compulsive.
Yes, that's why I demonstrated spelling it properly.
I was having a discussion with someone the other day (who you very well might be able to dox since he was one of the primary patients for the Canadian study on this, with one of the worse cases of Misophonia known.)
It appears to run in my own family along the male line, ranging from eating noises (my father) to a variety of vocal triggers mostly limited to my immediate family (most likely picked up when I was little during the period I spent the most time around them.)
While mine and my father's are controllable (although having triggered sessions of physical conflict between us!) the friend mentioned above have a broader range of noises that caused this effect in him, to the point of causing PTSD from people torturing him with the sounds.
Just because something isn't a big deal for you doesn't mean it isn't a hugely debilitating disease for other people. Sometimes there are available means to limit or mitigate the effects of them, but without focusing research on them the problem won't be better understood, and may result in people who really don't deserve it having social, legal, personal, etc problems because their condition isn't discernable as a debilitating neurological disorder. And the more of these disorders we understand, the better will we be able to understand our genes, our minds, and other impulses throughout our body. Narrowminded atiitudes like yours are what have been holding back ventures into science and technologies that 'obviously have no merit'.
I get furious just when eating. (This tendency is well-constrained by a vanishing tradition called 'table manners'). My theory (watch wildlife) is that creatures are most vulnerable while preoccupied with eating/drinking, so paranoia and watchfulness naturally rises then. If so, objecting to others audibly too close alongside is probably a simple displacement of an instinctive trait.
Another misleading headline. They didn't crack anything. Was there seriously anyone who doubted for one millisecond that that feeling was not somewhere in the brain? Of course it bloody is. The scans didn't reveal anything except a location that shows more activity when the condition occurs, and –suprise, surprise– it's an area known for precisely this.
But did they discover what sets up this association? No. Why these people experience it so strongly? Neither. So no cracking, just "located the area", and even that's surrounded by uncertainty given the experimental conditions.
I wish they would all just stop
Finally this problem gets some recognition.
these damn loud eating noises, some people make noises like fucking animals
What bothers the shit out of me is the one guy a cubicle over that never ceases to have a mouth full of food smacking away while talking on the phone. I can't stand that smug-sounding, loud mumbling. And 9 times out of 10, that food is, of course, sardines or tunafish (of course).
Thats 10/10 dagnabbit
Gently reply
While anger is indeed the emotion I feel, I would say it's more specific in that it feels like being molested/provoked/having your privacy invaded, which then fuels and intense anger and desire to lash out and stop it. I haven't been sexually molested myself (that I know of), but I think everyone knows the feeling of being provoked and teased, e.g. by siblings. It's weird, since the eating companion has nothing like this on their mind, they're just enjoying a meal.
I hope they do some more research on this, it's an odd affliction.
In a similar light, I have often wondered why many people (male or female), including myself, can react with anger/aggression to screaming babies. That doesn't seem evolutionary healthy. My conclusion is that it creates a powerful incentive to silence the baby, not with a stone, but by picking it up. Eventually, mothers and caretakers end up carrying the babies around all day (wrapping them in a cloth they wear), as you see in traditional cultures. The motion and contact silence the baby. This could have increased survival rates enough for a mechanism to evolve. Just a hunch.
Been using over-the-ear headphones at work listening to pink noise for the last ~10 years, which works pretty well to block out the sounds of people typing, coughing, grunting, breathing, sighing, walking, playing music, and generally existing.
I would give up everything I own to be able to wipe out my excessively angry reactions to most sounds.
Well they do sound like noise of sexual intercourse, if you come to think about it. Get into the patient's history, figure out when they were exposed to sex without wanting it (usually in early childhood, stumbling upon mommy and daddy "doing it"), do some therapy, get over it.
I can't stand the noise my dad makes when he is eating. I can stand the noise of other people eating. I guess that's the story... No need for a "brain disorder". It's just psychological patterns that end up rewiring the brain that way.
When you get nervous before an appearance, your mouth gets dry, and thusly you start to make smacking noises as you speak. Every sentence, every syllable is accompanied by that horrid noise of your face flapping open and shut as you squirt air through your meat. Worse, it's being captured by a microphone, so all that high-frequency smacking is jammed right into my brain through my ear-hole with skin-writhing intimacy. It makes me want to smash the device I am listening to. And scream.
For pity's sake, if you are going to get nervous as you speak, bring a glass of water, or a lemon drop, or chew some gum before hand. Don't let your mouth get dry, or I will be forced to reach across time and space so that I might throttle you.
"...break-up more households than infidelity."
Why is it good to close your mouth when you eat?
1. You won't spray all over everyone and everything while you masticate.
2. More food makes it into your gut, so you're less of a wasteful slob in an otherwise hugely wasteful age.
3. People won't have to raise their voices to have a conversation over your meat-flapping noises.
4. You won't announce your gastronomic preoccupation to predators.
The summary says: "There are no treatments". That is quite strange, since last year I've seen news reports that said treatment for this exact problem was possible and often quite effective. As I remember, it was basically psychological training to associate the infuriating sounds with a non-infuriating thought. For example: if the thought of a rabbit eating a carrot does not anger the patient, then whenever he feels a surge of anger from hearing a nearby person eating an apple, he is to think of the harmless rabbit until the flash of anger has subsided. Probably easier said than done, but still, actual patients were saying it worked pretty well for them.
Now all we have to do is to interpret this discovery. I think there are two socially sensible options you can choose from:
1) Manners are a form of insanity. If you don't like people smacking during lunch it's your own fault.
2) Manners are a form of insanity. If you smack while eating you are hurting mentally ill people and should be ashamed of yourself.
Happy voting!
Did anyone mention snoring yet?
I too have this condition since childhood, nice to finnaly know it has a name and is considered a "condition". :) . The joys of people who don't really care about others feelings.....
My problem is mainly or only the very loud Crunching sounds , they sound like bones being crushed to me and i get VERY unsettled and angry with it.
That is also why a headset with music does bring some releave when people are warned , asked not to overdo it, but then most certainly WILL overdo it , just to pleasant company to me
If eating sounds make you angry, don't eat sounds!
Some people just take synesthesia too far.
Brain is one of the most complex organs we have, we have not fully understood many deep functions and mechanisms of it. And suddenly you want to pump electrons across this organ which seems to be mostly working on electro-chemistry?
sed -e 's/Chuck Norris/Rajnikant/g' joke > fact
I wonder if I have this or something like it. I'm definitely sensitive to the sounds of people eating. The personal hell would probably include someone eating really crispy potato chips with their mouth open, licking and smacking their lips. It makes me unjustifiably angry and frustrated. I know my emotional reaction to it isn't proportional to the offense, but it makes me temporarily hate the person who's eating.
I have another weird thing, and I wonder if that might be connected. I wouldn't normally connect it, but if they're saying it's due to a weird response in the brain to sound, maybe it is? Basically, really loud music makes me sleepy. Like, I've gone to punk shows where the music is extremely loud and somewhat grating, and I feel an immediate need to go to sleep. If there's a comfortable place to sit, I might just drift off. As soon as I get out into an environment that's quieter, my energy returns. I'm not sure I noticed it until someone else pointed it out. I've thought that maybe it's like my brain gets overloaded and says, "Nope, this is too much. I'm shutting down."
So now I'm just wondering, maybe I have a generalized thing where my brain is responding strangely to auditory stimuli.
Yes, they've shown that the 'over amplification' of a specific stimulus is visible in brain scans. I would wonder whether any oversensitivity is possible without something being visible in a brain scan. In addition, whether learned oversensitivities show up in brain scans, and so on. The hallmark of a scientific theory is how it survives attempts to empirically disprove it. What kind of attempts to empirically disprove brain-scan-based theories have there been? Why should a skeptic be convinced this isn't in the same category as Quantum Woo from deepest darkest Totnes? (I don't think it is, but equally I take such things with a very large dose of salt.)
...that this condition is being studied at all. I've had this for as long as I can remember; my sister has it too. Trying to rationalize it away by telling yourself "this response is completely irrational and is all in your head" does nothing to help. When we were kids, family meals were fraught with negative emotion. The table was a cold war between our parents on either end and the only sounds were of people eating. I still wonder if that experience was a contributor or a coincidence.
I agree. Eating in public comes from a position of privilege. It's no surprise that restaurants are usually filled with white people whose access should be limited. Restaurant patrons should be AT LEAST 25% black, 10% lesbian, 48.5% Eskimo. The whites can have what's left.
You don't have a Church's Chicken in your neighborhood, do you?
Little Miss Can't Be Wrong! Everybody wants to get the most stupid stuff published because we all know stupid stuff gets the eyeballs! And scrotumballs!
they are unpleasant sounds, what's wrong with disliking them?
it's not a disorder.
i hate the noises of knives cutting into vegetation, always have. hate it 10 times more when some artsy chef is doing it to impress some customers to agree to a bill. am not saying im a sun gazer who persecutes vegan peoples, but actually hate the dramatization vibes and not the actualcutting itself. Mainly because in the Office of Armiger we present ourselves as ethically as possible. I do say that the Ministry of funny Walks is in good tastes.
Have a good day sir.
Typical America. Everything has a pill. ...or Americans could simply not act like pigs and dont eat with your damn mouths open. Oh wait that requires people to actually do something. How stupid of me.
Sure you could treat it as an illness and electrocute the brains of anyone that gets pissed off by the sound of others eating loudly... (What next... electrocute the brains of anyone who doesn't agree with your musical taste?).
If you're going to announce to all the sabertooths that there are tasty humans grazing over here, go do it over there!
As copyright owner of this comment, I authorize everyone to defeat any technological measure which limits access to it.
I'm 100% unimpressed by the fact that either no one took the time to teach such folk manners, or that having been taught, they failed to integrate these basic socializations. While it may be polite to slurp in China, it isn't most other places. Consequently, it's not okay to slurp here, just because it's okay to slurp in China.
People can certainly chew with their mouths open, talk as loudly as they want, mumble, hold their tableware like a monkey with a broken wrist, face-dive into their dishes while eating, drool, snort, ignore personal grooming, blow their nose at the table, bang their tea/coffee cup with their spoon, fail to hold doors for others, fail to keep appointments, never say thank you, start their sentences with "me and...", fail to show up when they said they would, slurp their drinks and soups, dive into their cellphones at meals, drive down the street with their windows down and their audio maxed out, cut in line...
But I feel no obligation to respect or forgive them for any of it, or subject myself to their company, or keep them on as an employee.
There's nothing wrong with any of these things that some (very) basic socialization wouldn't cure. I consider my ostracization of adults exhibiting these characteristics to be nothing less than my social duty.
TLDR: It is incumbent on us to learn basic manners and consideration; also, being moderately irritated by inconsiderate social behavior isn't a syndrome. It's evidence of being civilized.
Raging at such things is something else again.
I've fallen off your lawn, and I can't get up.
But how do you eat sounds?
I'm a good cook. I'm a fantastic eater. - Steven Brust
Macdonalds has a farm, McDonalds is a fast-food chain.
#DeleteFacebook
Is this anger reflex really a thing? Glad I don't have such triggers, I'd rather not feel angry if possible
It is pretty effective at reducing your appetite when you are deeply offended by the squishy pulping glomping noises coming out of your own head like a snot nosed child smacking their way through some slovenly-packaged carb-loaded nutritional horror sold by a major company to idiot parents.
But then that's probably just the anger talking.
How did you eat a Snap Crackle Pop, sir? Is the sound of Soylent Brown not good enough for you?
Also, I heard the sound of Callista Flockhart blowing in the wind; she looked tasty enough to eat but I didnt bring an umbrella and raincoat.
If a 3d printer can print solid objects, can a 3d speaker cause air to condense into a tasty solid?
n/t
Please let them know what you think about this disorder.
http://www.ncl.ac.uk/ion/staff...
They see it as you eating deprives them of being able to reinforce their lard layer in their primitive brains, hahaha! It enrages them you are eating and they are not!
This reads to me like just..
Another culturally specific human set of behaviours being masqueraded as universal, fundamental human trait.
For shame...?
Reading this article makes me angry.
Welcome to the pinacle of progress; we in the late 1930s are lucky to be present to witness today's finest minds dominating problems which have previously gone unsolved.
Requiem for the American Dream
rs2937573 variant of chromosome #5 is associated with misophonia:
https://blog.23andme.com/23andme-research/something-to-chew-on/
Have you seen dogs sharing a plate and the one becoming angry at the other(s) in an instant *after* they both start eating?
A plausible explanation for the survival of such genetic instance is that it leads to competition near food sources.
There are a lot of inconvenient sounds (chalkboard scratches, babies crying, sirens and alarms going of, jack hammers drilling etc.) but they are just that: inconvenient. I usually can cope with that. What absolutely enrages me however are certain sounds of eating. It's not cutlery scratching on the dish as others are reporting, it's more like someone self-suffiently and obliviously smacking their lips. I can't help, it boils my blood. I'm probably just some kind of misanthrop, envious of the joy of living of other people.
My 17 year old daughter has dealt with this illness for years. Someone nearby chewing gum, anybody eating popcorn in a theater, even someone enjoying a piece of hard candy is a trigger for her. Family meals at the dinner table have been an ordeal for as long as I can remember. No laughing matter in my family.
Silly pedant. Mc = Mac.