Synesthesia

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This got started elsewhere but I thought it deserved a thread of its own. How many people here have it? What are your experiences?

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Cut from the previous thread:

The primary question is, do your perceptions stay constant over time? A synesthete can be tested at 8 for color-letter synesthesia, and still see the exact same colors at 68... far beyond what an average person would have been able to memorize.

Another measure of degree is whether you get the sensations in your mind's eye, or whether you actually see/hear/taste/smell/feel them in the outside world.



I see colors in letters and numbers on a page, though if the character is printed in an unusual color, that's generally strong enough to override the synesthesia. I also see music, just in my mind - like a dark field with bursts of color in specific places, sometimes with different textures. I sometimes see colors in people's personalities - though interestingly that's faded the better I've come to understand how people work. I also have perfect pitch - for everything except the human voice - because the color of a note and its sound come hand in hand. With voices, their verbal meaning drowns out the colors, even if the person is just singing "aaaah".



I think this part is just visual thinking. It's normal to imagine something when someone names it (though whether you do it in pictures, words, or something else depends on the person). But synesthesia is when unrelated senses cross over. For example if you smelled mint whenever someone named a certain color.

Does thinking Olivia sounds like an amardillo name count?

i dont know if this is linked but i was given a jumper i couldn't wear because if i touched it i got the taste of metal in my mouth?

You know, I never knew it wasn't normal to see colours or smell things when people said certain words. I always thought everyone was like that, until now.

http://www.mixsig.net/

Right now, I can only think of a single thing that might qualify: many years ago, when I heard Beethoven's "Piano Sonata No. 8 in C Minor, Op. 13 'Pathetique': Adagio Cantabile" (wow - *that's* what that's called?! What a mouthful!), I suddenly "saw" a particular shade of blue that might best be described as the Cadet Blue crayon color from the original 64 Crayola box...

When I listen to music I can see paintings. Or smell things.

I don't think that really counts, though...

Until I learned what synesthesia was, I thought I was the only person who saw a different color according to the music's key. I also see numbers, letters, days of the week, etc. in color. "Monday" looks cocoa-brown while "Tuesday" is burnt sienna and "Wenesday" is lime-green, things like that.

OMGzorz my favorite Beethoven piece!

On-topic: I can't say I've ever experienced any mixing of the senses, but a friend of mine has synaesthesia, and he describes it as a perfectly natural feeling. He was amazed to find out not everyone associates days of the week with colors. He told me all about it, especially how his idol Nikola Tesla had a powerful case of it that totally disrupted his life. Funny how synaesthesia tends to correlate with AS. Besides the obvious sensory stuff, they don't seem much alike at all.

http://psyche.cs.monash.edu.au/v2/psych ... towic.html

Very interesting stuff. I don't experience symptoms of Synesthesia but INTERESTING all the same. *avid grin, firey eagerness in eyes* "Information!... Just give me more information... more, more, MORE!! !"

I have never experienced synesthesia and am surprised that half the people who've voted claim they either have it or are unsure whether they have it or not.

These polls tend to be skewed in favor of the topic at hand - probably most of the people who don't have it either didn't bother to vote, or didn't read the thread.

i certainly have associations between days and colours, numbers and colours, and between smells and things, and the like. but i wouldn't claim to have the condition defined as synaesthesia.

i think pyraxis is right - i haven't voted in the poll, as i'd have to vote "i doubt it, but who knows?".

Both. With music it is my mind's eye, but often appears very vividly as if I sam seeing the colors on the back of my eyelids. Usually the colors, or images are set back in my brain and are often very vivid as if I am watching a movie. The more intense the music, the more vivid they become. Also, sometimes I will have something somewhere on my body that causes another part of my body to itch. Something like a bump on my back will make part of my leg itch and if I touch the bump the sensation will get more extreme in my leg. I do not see colors when I read text and the smells are hard to pinpoint because I have had seizures and smells can be related to some of them also, but I have noticed certain smells when seeing certain things (especially on TV), I just never kept a record of it.

I have never (as one doctor put it) really been able to have an intrapersonal relationship (that is a relationship with myself). He said that I have never really been able to go inside of my mind and explore things. This is because of my hyper-focus, which is so intense that I get what the docs called "tunnel vision." I focus so much on a certain task that I am not even aware of what is going on in my own head. When listening to music, during soft passages the colors and images are softer, whereas during intense passage the sensations intensify and become more apparent.

I do not know if I have perfect pitch. I have only recently been coming to an understanding of Savant Syndrome and how it affects me. When I compose music I just know what will work and what won't, I can't explain it better than that. If I am multitracking it is extremely apparent and often highly disturbing if one note is even slightly off pitch (same thing when listening). Although I am familiar with major and minor scales on guitar and piano I usually have to look at the instrument to identify the note. The term "idiot savant" really does fit me and I don't find it insulting because in one way I am a total idiot and in another way a genius (my doc's terminology). My memory is more visual, I remember what I see faster than what I hear. Anyhow, I got sidetracked there...

The things in my mind that I notice when listening to music seem to be present in various locations, but writing this is forcing me to analyze it a little more. It is as if there is a stage in my mind, but I can't pinpoint its orientation. Things move from front to back on the stage, EXACTLY like the stereo field, OH MAN! IT MAKES SENSE!! !! !! !! !! !! !!

I am seeing a visual interpretation of the stereo field when I listen to music!! ! The stereo field generated by the two speakers is often called a "soundstage" when discussing mxing audio. It refers to where specific sounds in a mix are placed by using EQ, panning and effects. I am seeing the soundstage in my mind.

I do not know if certain colors, shapes, or whatever remain the same when listening to specific notes because there are so many variations of sound when listening to the complex pieces of music that I like to lsiten to that often there is only a blur of colors,like a rainbow. Also, I am usually so focused on other details of a composition that I "tune out" my own brain in favor of putting myself deeper into the music. If I am just playing notes on a piano I am usually more focused on attack and decay. I have never tried to identify whether, or not I see a specific color at a specific frequency, but I think such an attempt would be futile because even the slightest change in a mix, or EQ changes the color, or visual qualities that I am aware of when listening to music. I hope that makes some sense.

I have synaesthesia, it's strongest with numbers, letters, words representing things that are sequential (days of the week, months etc), people's names, and music, and weaker but still present for other words and sounds. Mostly I see colours, but for some words I also get smell, taste, shape and texture. Most words are one colour only, but I have identified some long words that go through a range of colours.

I wouldn't say it interferes a great deal, and I wouldn't want to be without it, but it does add to issues of sensory overload. Imagine being in a crowded store where music is playing, people are talking, and there are written signs. It is bad enough for many of us as is - add to that the colours and other sensory perceptions generated by the music, talking, and written signs, and you get some idea of how it can cause problems in some environments. It can also interfere with concentration when reading or writing.

Interesting that one of the quoted bits posted by Sophist (thanks!) mentions allochiria, as I also have auditory allochiria - the perception that noise from the left is incorrectly coming from the right and vice versa. One has to be a little careful crossing the road

I don't think so. I sometimes "see" words I hear or say in my head as if they were printed/typed, but I don't think that really counts. Nor does the fact that my thoughts sometimes "sound" like the voice of whoever I've been listening to a lot lately (whatever friend I've been hanging out with or show I've been watching). The former is not severe or constant, and neither is tha latter, plus it doesn't mix any senses.