Why do some people need to listen to music CONSTANTLY?!

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doeintheheadlights
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21 Aug 2010, 10:21 am

It drives me crazy! My whole family likes listening to music all the time so the radio's always on. Yesterday I went with my mom on a 12 hour car ride and the music was on the whole time! And it wasn't just on it was blasting. My sister even has it on full blast in her room while she sleeps. Kids at my university do the same thing, they always have their headphones blasting at full volume, and whenever there's a computer in the classroom it will be playing music. I just can't stand it, I don't know how people can think with the music on 24/7. I like music a lot, but after listening to even my favourite tunes for more than a couple of minutes at a time I start to get a headache and am ready to turn it off. Don't people like quiet time anymore?



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21 Aug 2010, 10:30 am

To drown out their thoughts. The quiet is lonely?


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21 Aug 2010, 10:35 am

I make my own music, but have always had problems with it being loud, if it wasn't for the distortion that having it at a certain dB level produces, then it's because I'm exhausted from it. It's pretty crazy, I don't know how people can do this either.


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jagatai
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21 Aug 2010, 10:44 am

I agree. It drives me crazy too.

When I was a kid, my mother would keep a TV on in the kitchen. She would send me in to do dishes or some other chore and she would be in the living room. I would immediately turn off the TV since it was extremely distracting to me. Then she would come in and get angry that I turned off the TV while she was out. Apparently she can concentrate better with the TV going. I don't understand this at all.

If I play music, it is only when I am exercising or if I specifically want to listen to music. Otherwise I like quiet. If I hear voices while I am asleep I will wake up immediately. Even faint music is extremely distracting. But oddly enough the sound of traffic, helicopters etc (I live in a dense urban neighborhood) doesn't really annoy me. I think it is structured sound that captures my attention.

I don't know if this is related at all, but the music that really appeals to me tends to be syncopated. The intentional break in the structure of a rythmn affects me on some deep, indefinable level.

Anyway, in answer to your question, it seems that some people's minds are wired so that they can only concentrate while there is structured noise in the background. I would guess that these people are extroverts who feel better when there are people around. I feel my best when I am alone so I tend to be distracted and on the alert when there is music or a TV going.


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21 Aug 2010, 10:51 am

Now days TV is very monotonous and I usually only wake up instantly if suddenly a loud commercial is on or the start of a show is more dramatic than necessary. But when I have TV, I also use it to do chores around the house, but only because of the shows I like watching, and have already seen. It helps to set a kind of schedule. I also used to listen to it for sleeping, but the whole jumping when a show gets dramatic in the begining especially when it's right at the end of my sleep cycle has made it to where I just did it for naps. Don't have TV now, cause it's too expensive!


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21 Aug 2010, 11:36 am

I like to constantly listen to music to get the crap experiences out of my head, it normally works for a good while and most of the times, its useful to me for my social anxieties.


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21 Aug 2010, 11:55 am

I like using music to drown out everything around me. Even if there's nothing in my environment that warrants being drowned out, sometimes I just like having it on for background noise. But if I listen to music for too long, it begins to grate on my nerves and I wind up flinging my iPod Shuffle off of my shirt as though it were a spider! :lol:



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21 Aug 2010, 1:36 pm

Music is my life.

Sometimes I have to turn it off to play videogames or watch movies, though ¬_¬

Obviously I turn it off to practice, too.

I don't have it "blasting" though. Sometimes I do if I'm in a really good "singalong" mood, but after a while it grates on me and I've gotta turn it back down.


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arecibo_
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21 Aug 2010, 2:13 pm

Music is the perfect escapism.



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21 Aug 2010, 2:27 pm

I have ADHD. It's like having 57 channels on in my head constantly. Music helps fill some of those channels, which makes concentrating on anything -- work, gaming, driving, conversation -- easier. The only time I don't play music is when I'm writing...all 57 channels are consumed by writing!



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21 Aug 2010, 2:40 pm

Music calms me.


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21 Aug 2010, 3:42 pm

doeintheheadlights wrote:
It drives me crazy! My whole family likes listening to music all the time so the radio's always on. Yesterday I went with my mom on a 12 hour car ride and the music was on the whole time! And it wasn't just on it was blasting. My sister even has it on full blast in her room while she sleeps. Kids at my university do the same thing, they always have their headphones blasting at full volume, and whenever there's a computer in the classroom it will be playing music. I just can't stand it, I don't know how people can think with the music on 24/7. I like music a lot, but after listening to even my favourite tunes for more than a couple of minutes at a time I start to get a headache and am ready to turn it off. Don't people like quiet time anymore?


I feel a similar way. I listen to music at home, and I sometimes listen to instrumental background music when I'm reading, but when I see people wearing their headphones on the train in the morning, I can't understand the appeal. When I'm on the train in the morning I just want to read or (more often) sleep. I sometimes wonder if these people do not know their own minds enough to realise what they are doing is not pleasurable: a symptom of anhedonia perhaps. Then I start to think that since I have AS, it is more likely that I'm the one with anhedonia, and NTs can just get acclimatised to noise. Moreover, it seems like some people actually need to be subjected to noise every waking hour. I think the modern technological world has done something to people's brains!



Last edited by skysaw on 26 Aug 2010, 3:26 pm, edited 1 time in total.

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21 Aug 2010, 3:53 pm

Because it helps me to get through the day, without going crazy, and music is my special interest. It also keeps me from having emotional flashbacks, because my mind is occupied with something, other than thoughts. After I'm done with my 14 hours of music, I take 2 melatonin, so that I'm too tired to think, and than I go to sleep.


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BigJohnnyCool
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21 Aug 2010, 6:33 pm

I don't get it either, my mom is that kind of person that needs something playing the background to keep her focused. I'm pretty much the opposite of that kind of thing. I don't usually listen to the radio because I find it distracting...



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22 Aug 2010, 9:44 am

skysaw wrote:
...when I see people wearing their headphones on the train in the morning, I can't understand the appeal. When I'm on the train in the morning I just want to read or (more often) sleep.


I can't speak for others, but personally, reading in a vehicle makes me incredibly motion sick. Music (or lately I've been listening to radio dramas) helps a lot.

skysaw wrote:
I sometimes wonder if these people do not know their own minds enough to realise what they are doing is not pleasurable: a symptom of anhedonia perhaps.


Music...not pleasurable? :?

Unless you mean the stuff kids call "music" these days :oops:

I hate when people are driving around with their bass thumping...all you hear is "bummm bum bum" over and over...I don't know that's enjoyable at all.

But I digress.


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22 Aug 2010, 5:16 pm

i concur