Does your blood boil at the sound of pen tapping, heavy breathing, or the ultimate in social crimes... Loud chewing?
Does everyone scoff at your explanation that you suffer from 'misophonia' - literally, hatred of sound?
Congratulations, science has vindicated you at last. Breathe freely (but not too loudly).
New research from Newcastle University suggests that those of us tormented by certain sounds could in fact have a brain abnormality - explaining the seemingly disproportionate overreaction to your colleague's crisp habit.
The study, published in the journal Current Biology, suggests a difference in the frontal lobe between those who have intense reaction to sound, and those who don't.
According to the study, 'The Brain Basis for Misophonia', the condition is “an effective sound-processing disorder characterised by the experience of strong negative emotions (anger and anxiety) in response to everyday sounds, such as those generated by other people eating, drinking, chewing, and breathing.
Scans detected a change in brain activity of a misophonic when a 'trigger sound' was heard: specifically, in the “emotional control mechanism”, which caused the brains to go into overdrive.
The commonplace nature of these sounds (often referred to as “trigger sounds”) makes misophonia a devastating disorder for sufferers and their families, and yet nothing is known about the underlying mechanism.
According to Tim Griffiths, professor of Cognitive Neurology at Newcastle University and UCL: “I was part of the sceptical community myself until we saw patients in the clinic and understood how strikingly similar the features are.”
Dr Sukhbinder Kumar, of the Institute of Neuroscience at Newcastle, said that for many people with misophonia this will come as welcome news, “as for the first time we have demonstrated a difference in brain structure and function in sufferers”.
This study demonstrates the critical brain changes as further evidence to convince a sceptical medical community that this is a genuine disorder.
Other studies have suggested that those suffering from the disorder might even be cognitively superior in other ways.
According to research from Northwestern University, there is a correlation between hypersensitivity to particular sounds (or 'leaky sensory gating'), and high levels of creativity.
The study explains:
Overall results suggest that leaky sensory gating may help people integrate ideas that are outside of focus of attention, leading to creativity in the real world; whereas divergent thinking, measured by divergent thinking tests which emphasize numerous responses within a limited time, may require selective sensory processing more than previously thought.
More: Frequent swearing linked to high intelligence, study finds
