Thread: ASMR - Autonomous Sensory Meridian Response

I find it interesting that so many people have this triggered by music and whispers. None of those videos do anything for me. The only time anything happens while I listen to music is if a particular part of the song is flat out fucking amazing, and the tingling comes due to very subtle conscious effort. I experience how good the song is, and at the same time I make it more. It's a very difficult concept to explain. The only ASMR I get as a result of an external trigger is if I am getting my hair buzzed off or sometimes if I run my hands through my hair (they're nearly the same cause). Otherwise I internally trigger it myself. Though, I do remember as a child that I experienced this phenomenon, but it was entirely at random--it was never caused by anything. I tried explaining it to people but they told me I was just having chills, but it's distinctly different. I couldn't argue with them though, I didn't even know what it was myself.

Originally Posted by snoop

I find it interesting that so many people have this triggered by music and whispers. None of those videos do anything for me. The only time anything happens while I listen to music is if a particular part of the song is flat out fucking amazing, and the tingling comes due to very subtle conscious effort. I experience how good the song is, and at the same time I make it more. It's a very difficult concept to explain.

Actually, i fully understood that It happens the same way for me too ^^

Originally Posted by snoop

I find it interesting that so many people have this triggered by music and whispers. None of those videos do anything for me.

Me either. The video I just posted only works on the part where she's scratching the microphones. You need both headphones on otherwise it didn't do much.

And yeah, I sort of have to give the subtle conscious effort too. In fact I can do it by just using my mind.

Can't remember whether I posted this before, but here is an explanation.

People who become euphoric over music unleash dopamine, a brain chemical that also induces the sense of reward that comes from food, psychoactive drugs and money, a new study says. McGill University researchers in Montreal, Canada, recruited eight volunteers aged 19-24 among 217 people who responded to advertisements requesting people who experienced ‘chills’ - a marker of extreme pleasure - when listening to music.
After careful selection, the volunteers were put into a positron emission tomography (PET) scanner, which is able to spot a tagged chemical, raclopride, that works on dopamine receptors in brain cells.
Neutral music leaves listeners emotionally cold
They were also wired up to sensors that measured them for heartbeat, respiration, temperature and skin conductance.
Listening to their favourite piece of spine-tingling music, the volunteers showed a rush of physical activity and also unlocked a release of dopamine in the striatum area of the brain. The effect occurred even in anticipation, before the ‘chill’ peak occurred.
But no such dopamine surge was seen when the volunteers listened to neutral music which, previous tests showed, was known to leave them emotionally cold.
Discovering music’s exclusive appeal
Seeking to find out more, the scientists then put the volunteers in a frequency magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) scanner, which highlights flows of blood in the head, thus showing which part of the brain is being activated.
A part of the striatum known as the caudate was involved during the anticipation phase. But during the peak emotional response, a different striatum area known as the nucleus accumbens was involved.
The results shed light on the exclusive regard that humans have for music, say the researchers.

http://www.cosmosmagazine.com/news/3...same-chemicals

And I find this bit extremely interesting:
One possible explanation for this is because of the emotions invoked by music - "expectations, delay, tension, resolution, prediction, surprise and anticipation," among others.

Maybe we just love music so much because it contains those elements. And the reason we listen to it so much is it's readily available.
I remember going to a play last year, and I felt that surge far more powerfully than most of the times I'm listening to my favourite music.
And plays definitely have all those elements.

As another aside, it also sort of reminds me of the relief you get after you carry out an OCD thing.