If you find yourself cringing at the sound of crunching food, slurping, or loud breathing, you're one of many people suffering from a genuine brain abnormality called misophonia. Over the years, scientists have debated whether it could be considered as a genuine medical disorder. Now, the result of a research reveals that it is indeed a medical problem as people with misophonia show abnormalities in their frontal lobe.
The newly named medical ailment has now been officially described as an intense hatred of certain harmless sounds such as loud chewing, breathing, and even repeated pen-clicking. It was first named in 2001 as more and more people reported of having such unpleasant sensations when they hear certain sounds. The study that proved that misophonia is indeed a medical condition was led by a team at the UK's Newcastle University.
Published in the journal Current Biology, the researchers reported of scanning the brains of the sounds sufferers to look for differences in their brain structure. Sure enough, their brain activity showed drastic changes when a 'trigger' sound was heard. Brain imaging further revealed that the this abnormality in brain activity affects their emotional control, causing their brains to go into overdrive on hearing trigger sounds, the CBS News reports.
Interestingly, the study also found that trigger sounds could evoke an acute heightened physiological response such as increased heart rate and sweating. For the study, the team used an MRI to measure brain activity of sufferers while they were listening to a variety of sounds: neutral sounds, unpleasant sounds, and trigger sounds. Participants that have the condition shows greater response to trigger sounds compared to non-sufferers, the Time reports.
“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," Dr Sukhbinder Kumar, from the Institute of Neuroscience said. Researchers were amazed at how strikingly similar the symptoms of the sufferers were. He added that the findings of the study are enough to convince a skeptical medical community that misophonia is a genuine disorder.
