Yes. You read it correctly. Actually, it was in the afternoon two days ago. I was sipping coffee and working while I bumped into an article about binaural audio rays to cure insomnia, anxiety and some psychological problems. It caught my interest when I came to know how virtual sessions can restore subjective matters. It got even better when I found out about ASMR treatment.
ASMR stands for Autonomous Sensory Meridian Response. The people who receive ASMR or can feel ASMR have reported that they feel tingling effect into their body. ASMR is a curious phenomenon. It is a self-reported neurological experience starts with the back of your head or scalp, neck and goes through your entire body.
Common Triggers
Soft speaking Or whispering
Sounds (Tapping, crinkling, unwrapping, scratching, brushing)
Personal attention or feeling empathetic.
Mouth Noise (Tongue moving chewing, mouth opening and closing)
Imagine a person offering you their undivided close attention. Imagine that person very close to your face, gently caressing your head, or softly whispering into your ears. They can brush your hair, do your makeup through audio or a video. And all you’re getting out of it is a delicious tingling feeling on the top of your head and in the entire body.
Benefits
Aside from the pleasurable sensation that ASMR offers a range of other benefits. Many intentional ASMR videos are specially formed for guided meditations, meditating regularly has been shown to reduce stress levels and aid concentration among many other things.
Additionally, people who suffer from insomnia and regularly have difficulty getting to sleep can use ASMR videos to distract and relax them and send them to sleep when nothing else will. Some ASMR videos are designed specifically for this purpose.
People also watch ASMR videos to help them ride out a panic attack, decrease anxiety, loneliness, stress, fear, worry, depression and even hypertension.
Still, it is a complex topic to research as the ASMR effects are subjective and it differs from person to person. Either you have them or not. And if you don't have them you might find it boring.
The science behind it
The triggers of the ASMR are fairly diverse but they all seem to engage same networks of the brain which interacts carefully and thoughtfully with our environment or with other people. There is something calmly satisfying about such things.
Steve Novella, director of general neurology at Yale School of Medicine, says it likely exists, but it just hasn't been classified yet.
"is it real? In this case, I don’t think there is a definitive answer, but I am inclined to believe that it is. There are a number of people who seem to have independently (that is always the key, but it is a recent enough phenomenon that this appears to be true) experienced and described the same syndrome with some fairly specific details. In this way it’s similar to migraine headaches—we know they exist as a syndrome primarily because many different people report the same constellation of symptoms and natural history" said Steve Novella.
ASMR could just be a way of activating the pleasure response. Vertebrate brains are fundamentally hardwired for pleasure and pain – for positive and negative behavioural feedback.
Have I tried it?
Yes. Yeah. ohh yeah. I so did. I can confirm that I have ASMR. It was quite tantalizing for me. Whispering and mouth noises induce more tinglings to me like most of the people who have experienced ASMR. But, different people get a different result from different triggers. There are lots of videos and a whole whisper community on youtube to try. Let me know your experience in the comment section.