You hear your spouse breathing nearby and you instantly get angry. Your 6-year-old yawns and it triggers a fight-or-flight reaction in you. You avoid restaurants because you can't stand the sound of chewing. Sounds other people don't even seem to notice, drive you up a wall.You might have misophonia.
What is misophonia?
People with misophonia are affected emotionally by common sounds — usually those made by others, and usually ones that other people don't pay attention to. The examples above (breathing, yawning, or chewing) create a fight-or-flight response that triggers anger and a desire to escape. Misophonia is little studied and we don't know how common it is. It affects some worse than others and can lead to isolation, as people suffering from this condition try to avoid these trigger sounds. People who have misophonia often feel embarrassed and don't mention it to healthcare providers — and often healthcare providers haven't heard of it anyway. Nonetheless, misophonia is a real disorder and one that seriously compromises functioning, socializing, and ultimately mental health. Misophonia usually appears around age 12, and likely affects more people than we realize.
What causes misophonia?
New research has started to identify causes for misophonia. A British-based research team studied 20 adults with misophonia and 22 without it. They all rated the unpleasantness of different sounds, including common trigger sounds (eating and breathing), universally disturbing sounds (of babies crying and people screaming), and neutral sounds (such as rain). As expected, persons with misophonia rated the trigger sounds of eating and breathing as highly disturbing while those without it did not. Both groups rated the unpleasantness of babies crying and people screaming about the same, as they did the neutral sounds. This confirmed that the misophonic persons were far more affected by specific trigger sounds, but don't differ much from others regarding other types of sounds.
The researchers also noted that persons with misophonia showed much greater physiological signs of stress (increased sweat and heart rate) to the trigger sounds of eating and breathing than those without it. No significant difference was found between the groups for the neutral sounds or the disturbing sounds of a baby crying or people screaming.
The brain science of misophonia
The team's important finding was in a part of the brain that plays a role both in anger and in integrating outside inputs (such as sounds) with inputs from organs such as the heart and lungs: the anterior insular cortex (AIC). Using fMRI scans to measure brain activity, the researchers found that the AIC caused much more activity in other parts of the brain during the trigger sounds for those with misophonia than for the control group. Specifically, the parts of the brain responsible for long-term memories, fear, and other emotions were activated. This makes sense, since people with misophonia have strong emotional reactions to common sounds; more importantly, it demonstrates that these parts of the brain are the ones responsible for the experience of misophonia.
The researchers also used whole-brain MRI scans to map participants' brains and found that people with misophonia have higher amounts of myelination. Myelin is a fatty substance that wraps around nerve cells in the brain to provide electrical insulation, like the insulation on a wire. It's not known if the extra myelin is a cause or an effect of misophonia and its triggering of other brain areas.
There is some good news regarding misophonia
Misophonia clinics exist throughout the US and elsewhere, and treatments such as auditory distraction (with white noise or headphones) and cognitive behavioral therapy have shown some success in improving functioning. For more information, contact theMisophonia Association.
FAQs
People with misophonia are affected emotionally by common sounds — usually those made by others, and usually ones that other people don't pay attention to. The examples above (breathing, yawning, or chewing) create a fight-or-flight response that triggers anger and a desire to escape.
What are the responses of misophonia? ›
Individuals with misophonia, a disorder involving extreme sound sensitivity, report significant anger, disgust, and anxiety in response to select but usually common sounds.
How does someone with misophonia act? ›
Misophonia is a condition where patients experience a negative emotional reaction and dislike (e.g., anxiety, agitation, and annoyance) to specific sounds (e.g., ballpoint pen clicking (repeatedly), tapping, typing, chewing, breathing, swallowing, tapping foot, etc.)
What is the truth about misophonia? ›
Misophonia isn't dangerous or life-threatening directly. However, it can negatively affect your mental health, relationships and well-being. People with misophonia often have other mental health conditions, too. People with severe misophonia may feel fearful or anxious about the possibility of hearing trigger sounds.
Is misophonia a fight or flight response? ›
The heightened trigger-specific autonomic responses we observed are consistent with the strong tendency of misophonic subjects to escape from the environment of trigger sounds [1, 2] or experience strong anxiety and anger if unable to escape (fight/flight response).
Is misophonia a form of autism? ›
At this stage there is no evidence that misophonia and Autism are related. A recent study did, however, find elevated Autistic traits in participants of their misophonia study, especially the Autism-related traits of sensory sensitivity and emotional dysregulation.
How is misophonia a trauma response? ›
The misophonic response to triggers shares considerable symptom overlap with sound trigger responses observed in PTSD. As with misophonia, those suffering from PTSD can experience a very strong emotional and physiological response to specific stimuli (such as sounds) that do not bother most people.
How do you calm someone with misophonia? ›
Coping strategies
- using noise-canceling headphones.
- listening to music, calming sounds, or white noise.
- distracting yourself with a calming mantra or affirmation.
- politely asking the person making the sound to stop.
The cause of misophonia is currently unknown; however, many individuals often report that the onset of the disorder is associated with a profound disgust of hearing family members eating during childhood. This supports the theory that recurrent conditioning from the individual's environment can lead to misophonia.
What are the traits of misophonia? ›
Studies have identified the following responses as symptomatic of misophonia:
- irritation turning to anger.
- disgust turning to anger.
- becoming verbally aggressive to the person making the noise.
- getting physically aggressive with objects, because of the noise.
- physically lashing out at the person making the noise.
Doctors aren't sure what causes misophonia, but it's not a problem with your ears. They think it's part mental, part physical. It could be related to how sound affects your brain and triggers automatic responses in your body.
What sounds do misophonia hate? ›
People with misophonia are affected emotionally by common sounds — usually those made by others, and usually ones that other people don't pay attention to. The examples above (breathing, yawning, or chewing) create a fight-or-flight response that triggers anger and a desire to escape.
Are people with misophonia smart? ›
This means that intelligence among the population with misophonia may be elevated, average, or below average and vary between forms, because the definitions of intelligence used in the current research are not similar.
What can be mistaken for misophonia? ›
Anxiety, bipolar, OCD, and other issues
Because your ears are normal and your hearing is fine, doctors may have difficulty with a diagnosis. Misophonia is sometimes mistaken for or compounded by anxiety, bipolar, or obsessive-compulsive disorder.
How rare is misophonia? ›
To date, there is little research on the prevalence of misophonia, with reported estimates varying between 5% and 20% in specific samples. A study of 483 American undergraduate students, reported that nearly 20% of the sample experienced clinically significant symptoms of misophonia [18].
Does misophonia get worse with age? ›
Moreover, misophonia can potentially worsen with age if left unaddressed, and give rise to coping strategies (e.g., wearing headphones) that could theoretically worsen sensitivity over time (Palumbo et al., 2018). Importantly, young children often cannot advocate for themselves to seek treatment.
How do people with misophonia react? ›
Their reactions can range from anger and annoyance to panic and the need to flee. The disorder is sometimes called selective sound sensitivity syndrome. Individuals with misophonia often report they are triggered by oral sounds -- the noise someone makes when they eat, breathe, or even chew.
What to do when misophonia is triggered? ›
Coping strategies
- using noise-canceling headphones.
- listening to music, calming sounds, or white noise.
- distracting yourself with a calming mantra or affirmation.
- politely asking the person making the sound to stop.
