Misophony what is, symptoms, causes and treatment

Everyday life is full of images, publicities, videos, sounds and environmental noises, among others. Large cities are characterized by having very high noise levels and this can cause stress, anxiety, anger and/or anguish. Many people have very diverse reactions to this kind of noise. However, there are people with a special sensitivity to daily noises such as opening a door, the drip of a water caniila, touching a remote control key or a deep breath. These people can react with a lot of anger, anxiety and/or stress against these moments.

It may have happened to you or that you know someone happens. ¿You want to know more about this? In this psychology-online article, we invite you to continue reading about the Misophony: What is it, what are its symptoms, causes and treatment.

1. What is misophony
2. Misophony symptoms
3. Causes of misophony
4. Misophony treatment

What is misophony

Misophony disease is a psychological disorder that is characterized by a special sensitivity of people who hate some daily noises produced by other nearby people. In general, reactions to these sounds are usually fury, anxiety, aggression and stress.

The term "misophony" belongs to the Greek, which means hate (miso) to sound (Fonia). Here begins to play an important role the social and emotional ties that the person who suffers from misophony has, since the same impact does not generate a noise made by someone close, such as a father, an uncle or a cousin, that the sound Made by a stranger. Those who suffer from misophony usually have a Low tolerance to sounds everyday.

Misophony symptoms

It is important to know what are the main symptoms of misophony, since its detection will allow us to go to a health professional who determines the type of treatment to address this problem. Next, we will see the characteristic symptoms of this disorder:

• Anger reactions, panic, fear and anxiety against usual sounds.
• Intention of hurting who produces sounds as a mode of defense (more serious cases)
• Evasion of daily activities To avoid daily sounds.
• Hypersensitivity Auditory.
• Actions aimed at avoiding noise: Cover your ears, ask the person not to make noise and put on headphones, among others.

We must emphasize that the beginning of the symptoms It can happen at any time in life, being more frequent at the end of childhood. The severity of misophony will depend on the characteristics of the person, since age, family context, medical family history must be taken into account and the person has pre -existing organic diseases.

Causes of misophony

¿What cause misophony? The triggers of this disorder are still being studied, since it is a land that continues to be explored. Yes ok There is no single cause that explain the origin of misophony, we can highlight some points that are important when studying this disorder. Therefore, we will describe the main causes of misophony.

Neurological disorders

When the person suffers from some neurological disorder, he interprets the nearby auditory stimuli erroneous by the central nervous system. This produces that certain noises be received with a much greater sensitivity than a person without this clinical picture. To understand it better, let's see how the sound perception process:

1. The sounds are converted into neuronal signals ranging from the auditory nerve to the thalamus, a region of the brain in charge of processing sensory information.
2. Then, these signs are directed towards the medial prefrontal cortex before reaching the tonsil. This allows a regulation of the emotions of a person in the face of the stimuli he receives.

In the case of people who present misophony, there would be no participation of the medial prefrontal cortex, so the reactions against sounds become more spontaneous.

Unpleasant experiences that occurred in childhood

Other causes of misophony is that during childhood, the person with the disorder lived a intense situation that marked him With some emotion such as fear, anger and/or anxiety about a specific sound. This can cause the individual to react in the same way to everyday sounds.

These are two hypotheses that could explain the origin of misophony, but the truth is that none of them is completely demonstrated.

Misophony treatment

In general, this clinical picture has no cure and the treatments are destined to improve the quality of life of those people who suffer from it. Both the diagnosis and the indication of the treatment of misophony should always be performed by a health professional, since it will be responsible for evaluating the patient's evolution taking into account the characteristics of each case. To treat misophony, the following methods can be used:

• Behavioral therapy: The treatment consists in exposing the patient to situations of daily noise with the intention of learning to ignore them.
• Meditation: This practice helps reduce the level of auditory sensitivity of the person through body relaxation exercises and negative thoughts. In this article, you will find more information about what meditation is for.
• Auditory reeducation: The objective of this treatment is the use of elements such as brocheles to relieve the irritation produced by certain sounds.

This article is merely informative, in psychology-online we have no power to make a diagnosis or recommend a treatment. We invite you to go to a psychologist to treat your particular case.

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